Gerrit Code Review vs SVN (Subversion): What are the differences?

Introduction

In this article, we will discuss the key differences between Gerrit Code Review and SVN (Subversion), two popular version control systems used in software development.

1. Integration with Git: Gerrit is built on top of Git, providing a code review workflow specifically designed for Git repositories. On the other hand, SVN is a centralized version control system that does not natively integrate with Git.

2. Code Review Workflow: Gerrit Code Review focuses heavily on code reviews, providing a powerful and flexible workflow for developers to review code changes before they are merged into the main codebase. This makes it easier to catch bugs, ensure code quality, and maintain a clean commit history. SVN, on the other hand, does not have a built-in code review workflow and relies on other tools or manual processes for code review.

3. Branching and Merging: Gerrit provides robust support for branching and merging, making it easier to manage concurrent development efforts and merge code changes across different branches. SVN also supports branching and merging, but it is generally considered less flexible and more cumbersome compared to Git-based systems like Gerrit.

4. Access Control: Gerrit offers fine-grained access control, allowing administrators to define permissions and restrictions at the project, branch, and even file level. This allows organizations to enforce stricter security policies and limit access to sensitive code or resources. SVN, on the other hand, has more limited access control capabilities and is primarily based on user-based permission settings.

5. Code Visibility: Gerrit offers developers a centralized platform to view, search, and navigate through code and commit history. It provides a web interface that makes it easy to inspect individual code changes and understand their context within the overall codebase. SVN, on the other hand, provides a more traditional file-based view of the code repository and lacks the same level of visibility and code navigation features as Gerrit.

6. Repository Size: Gerrit and Git both have a more efficient storage mechanism, compressing and storing the code repository in a more compact manner. SVN, being a centralized version control system, stores multiple copies of a file for each commit, which can lead to larger repository sizes over time.

In Summary, Gerrit Code Review is built on top of Git, provides a powerful code review workflow with branching and merging capabilities, fine-grained access control, enhanced code visibility, and efficient storage mechanisms. SVN, on the other hand, is a centralized version control system with limited code review capabilities, less flexible branching and merging, insufficient access control, and traditional file-based code visibility.