CI(1) USER COMMANDS CI(1)
NAME
ci - check in RCS revisions
SYNOPSIS
ci [options] file ...
DESCRIPTION
ci stores new revisions into RCS files. Each pathname
matching an RCS suffix is taken to be an RCS file. All oth
ers are assumed to be working files containing new revi
sions. ci deposits the contents of each working file into
the corresponding RCS file. If only a working file is
given, ci tries to find the corresponding RCS file in an RCS
subdirectory and then in the working file's directory. For
more details, see FILE NAMING below.
For ci to work, the caller's login must be on the access
list, except if the access list is empty or the caller is
the superuser or the owner of the file. To append a new
revision to an existing branch, the tip revision on that
branch must be locked by the caller. Otherwise, only a new
branch can be created. This restriction is not enforced for
the owner of the file if non-strict locking is used (see
rcs(1)). A lock held by someone else can be broken with the
rcs command.
Unless the -f option is given, ci checks whether the revi
sion to be deposited differs from the preceding one. If
not, instead of creating a new revision ci reverts to the
preceding one. To revert, ordinary ci removes the working
file and any lock; ci -l keeps and ci -u removes any lock,
and then they both generate a new working file much as if
co -l or co -u had been applied to the preceding revision.
When reverting, any -n and -s options apply to the preceding
revision.
For each revision deposited, ci prompts for a log message.
The log message should summarize the change and must be ter
minated by end-of-file or by a line containing . by itself.
If several files are checked in ci asks whether to reuse the
previous log message. If the standard input is not a termi
nal, ci suppresses the prompt and uses the same log message
for all files. See also -m.
If the RCS file does not exist, ci creates it and deposits
the contents of the working file as the initial revision
(default number: 1.1). The access list is initialized to
empty. Instead of the log message, ci requests descriptive
text (see -t below).
The number rev of the deposited revision can be given by any
of the options -f, -i, -I, -j, -k, -l, -M, -q, -r, or -u.
rev can be symbolic, numeric, or mixed. Symbolic names in
rev must already be defined; see the -n and -N options for
assigning names during checkin. If rev is $, ci determines
the revision number from keyword values in the working file.
If rev begins with a period, then the default branch (nor
mally the trunk) is prepended to it. If rev is a branch
number followed by a period, then the latest revision on
that branch is used.
If rev is a revision number, it must be higher than the lat
est one on the branch to which rev belongs, or must start a
new branch.
If rev is a branch rather than a revision number, the new
revision is appended to that branch. The level number is
obtained by incrementing the tip revision number of that
branch. If rev indicates a non-existing branch, that branch
is created with the initial revision numbered rev.1.
If rev is omitted, ci tries to derive the new revision num
ber from the caller's last lock. If the caller has locked
the tip revision of a branch, the new revision is appended
to that branch. The new revision number is obtained by
incrementing the tip revision number. If the caller locked
a non-tip revision, a new branch is started at that revision
by incrementing the highest branch number at that revision.
The default initial branch and level numbers are 1.
If rev is omitted and the caller has no lock, but owns the
file and locking is not set to strict, then the revision is
appended to the default branch (normally the trunk; see the
-b option of rcs(1)).
Exception: On the trunk, revisions can be appended to the
end, but not inserted.
OPTIONS
-rrev
Check in revision rev.
-r The bare -r option (without any revision) has an
unusual meaning in ci. With other RCS commands, a bare
-r option specifies the most recent revision on the
default branch, but with ci, a bare -r option reestab
lishes the default behavior of releasing a lock and
removing the working file, and is used to override any
default -l or -u options established by shell aliases
or scripts.
-l[rev]
works like -r, except it performs an additional co -l
for the deposited revision. Thus, the deposited revi
sion is immediately checked out again and locked. This
is useful for saving a revision although one wants to
continue editing it after the checkin.
-u[rev]
works like -l, except that the deposited revision is
not locked. This lets one read the working file imme
diately after checkin.
The -l, bare -r, and -u options are mutually exclusive
and silently override each other. For example,
ci -u -r is equivalent to ci -r because bare -r over
rides -u.
-f[rev]
forces a deposit; the new revision is deposited even it
is not different from the preceding one.
-k[rev]
searches the working file for keyword values to deter
mine its revision number, creation date, state, and
author (see co(1)), and assigns these values to the
deposited revision, rather than computing them locally.
It also generates a default login message noting the
login of the caller and the actual checkin date. This
option is useful for software distribution. A revision
that is sent to several sites should be checked in with
the -k option at these sites to preserve the original
number, date, author, and state. The extracted keyword
values and the default log message can be overridden
with the options -d, -m, -s, -w, and any option that
carries a revision number.
-q[rev]
quiet mode; diagnostic output is not printed. A revi
sion that is not different from the preceding one is
not deposited, unless -f is given.
-i[rev]
initial checkin; report an error if the RCS file
already exists. This avoids race conditions in certain
applications.
-j[rev]
just checkin and do not initialize; report an error if
the RCS file does not already exist.
-I[rev]
interactive mode; the user is prompted and questioned
even if the standard input is not a terminal.
-d[date]
uses date for the checkin date and time. The date is
specified in free format as explained in co(1). This
is useful for lying about the checkin date, and for -k
if no date is available. If date is empty, the working
file's time of last modification is used.
-M[rev]
Set the modification time on any new working file to be
the date of the retrieved revision. For example,
ci -d -M -u f does not alter f's modification time,
even if f's contents change due to keyword substitu
tion. Use this option with care; it can confuse
make(1).
-mmsg
uses the string msg as the log message for all revi
sions checked in. By convention, log messages that
start with # are comments and are ignored by programs
like GNU Emacs's vc package. Also, log messages that
start with {clumpname} (followed by white space) are
meant to be clumped together if possible, even if they
are associated with different files; the {clumpname}
label is used only for clumping, and is not considered
to be part of the log message itself.
-nname
assigns the symbolic name name to the number of the
checked-in revision. ci prints an error message if
name is already assigned to another number.
-Nname
same as -n, except that it overrides a previous assign
ment of name.
-sstate
sets the state of the checked-in revision to the iden
tifier state. The default state is Exp.
-tfile
writes descriptive text from the contents of the named
file into the RCS file, deleting the existing text.
The file cannot begin with -.
-t-string
Write descriptive text from the string into the RCS
file, deleting the existing text.
The -t option, in both its forms, has effect only dur
ing an initial checkin; it is silently ignored other
wise.
During the initial checkin, if -t is not given, ci
obtains the text from standard input, terminated by
end-of-file or by a line containing . by itself. The
user is prompted for the text if interaction is possi
ble; see -I.
For backward compatibility with older versions of RCS,
a bare -t option is ignored.
-T Set the RCS file's modification time to the new revi
sion's time if the former precedes the latter and there
is a new revision; preserve the RCS file's modification
time otherwise. If you have locked a revision, ci usu
ally updates the RCS file's modification time to the
current time, because the lock is stored in the RCS
file and removing the lock requires changing the RCS
file. This can create an RCS file newer than the work
ing file in one of two ways: first, ci -M can create a
working file with a date before the current time; sec
ond, when reverting to the previous revision the RCS
file can change while the working file remains
unchanged. These two cases can cause excessive recom
pilation caused by a make(1) dependency of the working
file on the RCS file. The -T option inhibits this
recompilation by lying about the RCS file's date. Use
this option with care; it can suppress recompilation
even when a checkin of one working file should affect
another working file associated with the same RCS file.
For example, suppose the RCS file's time is 01:00, the
(changed) working file's time is 02:00, some other copy
of the working file has a time of 03:00, and the cur
rent time is 04:00. Then ci -d -T sets the RCS file's
time to 02:00 instead of the usual 04:00; this causes
make(1) to think (incorrectly) that the other copy is
newer than the RCS file.
-wlogin
uses login for the author field of the deposited revi
sion. Useful for lying about the author, and for -k if
no author is available.
-V Print RCS's version number.
-Vn Emulate RCS version n. See co(1) for details.
-xsuffixes
specifies the suffixes for RCS files. A nonempty suf
fix matches any pathname ending in the suffix. An
empty suffix matches any pathname of the form RCS/path
or path1/RCS/path2. The -x option can specify a list
of suffixes separated by /. For example, -x,v/ speci
fies two suffixes: ,v and the empty suffix. If two or
more suffixes are specified, they are tried in order
when looking for an RCS file; the first one that works
is used for that file. If no RCS file is found but an
RCS file can be created, the suffixes are tried in
order to determine the new RCS file's name. The
default for suffixes is installation-dependent; nor
mally it is ,v/ for hosts like Unix that permit commas
in filenames, and is empty (i.e. just the empty suffix)
for other hosts.
-zzone
specifies the date output format in keyword substitu
tion, and specifies the default time zone for date in
the -ddate option. The zone should be empty, a numeric
UTC offset, or the special string LT for local time.
The default is an empty zone, which uses the tradi
tional RCS format of UTC without any time zone indica
tion and with slashes separating the parts of the date;
otherwise, times are output in ISO 8601 format with
time zone indication. For example, if local time is
January 11, 1990, 8pm Pacific Standard Time, eight
hours west of UTC, then the time is output as follows:
option time output
-z 1990/01/12 04:00:00 (default)
-zLT 1990-01-11 20:00:00-08
-z+05:30 1990-01-12 09:30:00+05:30
The -z option does not affect dates stored in RCS
files, which are always UTC.
FILE NAMING
Pairs of RCS files and working files can be specified in
three ways (see also the example section).
1) Both the RCS file and the working file are given. The
RCS pathname is of the form path1/workfileX and the working
pathname is of the form path2/workfile where path1/ and
path2/ are (possibly different or empty) paths, workfile is
a filename, and X is an RCS suffix. If X is empty, path1/
must start with RCS/ or must contain /RCS/.
2) Only the RCS file is given. Then the working file is
created in the current directory and its name is derived
from the name of the RCS file by removing path1/ and the
suffix X.
3) Only the working file is given. Then ci considers each
RCS suffix X in turn, looking for an RCS file of the form
path2/RCS/workfileX or (if the former is not found and X is
nonempty) path2/workfileX.
If the RCS file is specified without a path in 1) and 2), ci
looks for the RCS file first in the directory ./RCS and then
in the current directory.
ci reports an error if an attempt to open an RCS file fails
for an unusual reason, even if the RCS file's pathname is
just one of several possibilities. For example, to suppress
use of RCS commands in a directory d, create a regular file
named d/RCS so that casual attempts to use RCS commands in d
fail because d/RCS is not a directory.
EXAMPLES
Suppose ,v is an RCS suffix and the current directory con
tains a subdirectory RCS with an RCS file io.c,v. Then each
of the following commands check in a copy of io.c into
RCS/io.c,v as the latest revision, removing io.c.
ci io.c; ci RCS/io.c,v; ci io.c,v;
ci io.c RCS/io.c,v; ci io.c io.c,v;
ci RCS/io.c,v io.c; ci io.c,v io.c;
Suppose instead that the empty suffix is an RCS suffix and
the current directory contains a subdirectory RCS with an
RCS file io.c. The each of the following commands checks in
a new revision.
ci io.c; ci RCS/io.c;
ci io.c RCS/io.c;
ci RCS/io.c io.c;
FILE MODES
An RCS file created by ci inherits the read and execute per
missions from the working file. If the RCS file exists
already, ci preserves its read and execute permissions. ci
always turns off all write permissions of RCS files.
FILES
Temporary files are created in the directory containing the
working file, and also in the temporary directory (see
TMPDIR under ENVIRONMENT). A semaphore file or files are
created in the directory containing the RCS file. With a
nonempty suffix, the semaphore names begin with the first
character of the suffix; therefore, do not specify an suffix
whose first character could be that of a working filename.
With an empty suffix, the semaphore names end with _ so
working filenames should not end in _.
ci never changes an RCS or working file. Normally, ci
unlinks the file and creates a new one; but instead of
breaking a chain of one or more symbolic links to an RCS
file, it unlinks the destination file instead. Therefore,
ci breaks any hard or symbolic links to any working file it
changes; and hard links to RCS files are ineffective, but
symbolic links to RCS files are preserved.
The effective user must be able to search and write the
directory containing the RCS file. Normally, the real user
must be able to read the RCS and working files and to search
and write the directory containing the working file; how
ever, some older hosts cannot easily switch between real and
effective users, so on these hosts the effective user is
used for all accesses. The effective user is the same as
the real user unless your copies of ci and co have setuid
privileges. As described in the next section, these privi
leges yield extra security if the effective user owns all
RCS files and directories, and if only the effective user
can write RCS directories.
Users can control access to RCS files by setting the permis
sions of the directory containing the files; only users with
write access to the directory can use RCS commands to change
its RCS files. For example, in hosts that allow a user to
belong to several groups, one can make a group's RCS direc
tories writable to that group only. This approach suffices
for informal projects, but it means that any group member
can arbitrarily change the group's RCS files, and can even
remove them entirely. Hence more formal projects sometimes
distinguish between an RCS administrator, who can change the
RCS files at will, and other project members, who can check
in new revisions but cannot otherwise change the RCS files.
SETUID USE
To prevent anybody but their RCS administrator from deleting
revisions, a set of users can employ setuid privileges as
follows.
· Check that the host supports RCS setuid use. Consult a
trustworthy expert if there are any doubts. It is best if
the seteuid system call works as described in Posix
1003.1a Draft 5, because RCS can switch back and forth
easily between real and effective users, even if the real
user is root. If not, the second best is if the setuid
system call supports saved setuid (the {_POSIX_SAVED_IDS}
behavior of Posix 1003.1-1990); this fails only if the
real or effective user is root. If RCS detects any fail
ure in setuid, it quits immediately.
· Choose a user A to serve as RCS administrator for the set
of users. Only A can invoke the rcs command on the users'
RCS files. A should not be root or any other user with
special powers. Mutually suspicious sets of users should
use different administrators.
· Choose a pathname B to be a directory of files to be exe
cuted by the users.
· Have A set up B to contain copies of ci and co that are
setuid to A by copying the commands from their standard
installation directory D as follows:
mkdir B
cp D/c[io] B
chmod go-w,u+s B/c[io]
· Have each user prepend B to their path as follows:
PATH=B:$PATH; export PATH # ordinary shell
set path=(B $path) # C shell
· Have A create each RCS directory R with write access only
to A as follows:
mkdir R
chmod go-w R
· If you want to let only certain users read the RCS files,
put the users into a group G, and have A further protect
the RCS directory as follows:
chgrp G R
chmod g-w,o-rwx R
· Have A copy old RCS files (if any) into R, to ensure that
A owns them.
· An RCS file's access list limits who can check in and lock
revisions. The default access list is empty, which grants
checkin access to anyone who can read the RCS file. If
you want limit checkin access, have A invoke rcs -a on the
file; see rcs(1). In particular, rcs -e -aA limits access
to just A.
· Have A initialize any new RCS files with rcs -i before
initial checkin, adding the -a option if you want to limit
checkin access.
· Give setuid privileges only to ci, co, and rcsclean; do
not give them to rcs or to any other command.
· Do not use other setuid commands to invoke RCS commands;
setuid is trickier than you think!
ENVIRONMENT
RCSINIT
options prepended to the argument list, separated by
spaces. A backslash escapes spaces within an option.
The RCSINIT options are prepended to the argument lists
of most RCS commands. Useful RCSINIT options include
-q, -V, -x, and -z.
TMPDIR
Name of the temporary directory. If not set, the envi
ronment variables TMP and TEMP are inspected instead
and the first value found is taken; if none of them are
set, a host-dependent default is used, typically /tmp.
DIAGNOSTICS
For each revision, ci prints the RCS file, the working file,
and the number of both the deposited and the preceding revi
sion. The exit status is zero if and only if all operations
were successful.
IDENTIFICATION
Author: Walter F. Tichy.
Manual Page Revision: 5.17; Release Date: 1995/06/16.
Copyright © 1982, 1988, 1989 Walter F. Tichy.
Copyright © 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995 Paul Eggert.
SEE ALSO
co(1), emacs(1), ident(1), make(1), rcs(1), rcsclean(1),
rcsdiff(1), rcsintro(1), rcsmerge(1), rlog(1), setuid(2),
rcsfile(5)
Walter F. Tichy, RCS--A System for Version Control,
Software--Practice & Experience 15, 7 (July 1985), 637-654.
GNU Last change: 1995/06/16 1