Subversion is an open source version control system. Using Subversion, you can record the history of source files and documents. It manages files and directories over time. A tree of files is placed into a central repository. The repository is much like an ordinary file server, except that it remembers every change ever made to files and directories.

Subversion is built on a portability layer called APR—the Apache Portable Runtime library.

Subversion is a centralized system for sharing information. At its core is a repository, which is a central store of data. The repository stores information in the form of a filesystem tree—a typical hierarchy of files and directories. Any number of clients connect to the repository, and then read or write to these files. By writing data, a client makes the information available to others; by reading data, the client receives information from other

What makes the Subversion repository special is that it remembers every change ever written to it—every change to every file, and even changes to the directory tree itself, such as the addition, deletion, and rearrangement of files and directories.