Mercurial

As with Bazaar, Mercurial is a distributed VCS, which means there isn't the headache of arranging a centralized repository.

There is a very usable plugin for Windows users which integrates with Explorer: TortoiseHg, which makes Hg much nicer to use with Windows.

If you're using Windows, after installing TortoiseHg, just right click and use the provided interface.

Otherwise, common commands:

Common Commands

Starting a repository

• hg init - new repository
• hg clone repository - copy repository to current directory
• hg clone repository new repository - copy repository to a new location
• hg add file - add a file to the repository
• hg commit - commit changes to repository

Information

• hg log - show history
• hg status - show changed files
• hg diff - show changes to files
• hg tip - what's the latest changeset?

Pulling from a repository

• hg incoming repository - pull without changing
• hg pull repository - pull in changes from repository into current repository
• hg update - take changes from repository and applies to actual files

Pushing to a repository

• hg outgoing repository - push without changing
• hg push repository - push changes to repository

Merging repositories

• hg pull other repository - get their changes
• hg update - fails
• hg merge - merges changes
• hg commit - commits back to repository

Miscellaneous

• hg tag tagname - add a tag to the current version
• hg rename from to - rename a file
• hg revert filename - undo changes to file
• hg rollback - undo last commit or pull
• hg serve - super fast way of sharing a repository

Hosting

To host a mercurial repository

Assuming you have Python installed...

Install Mercurial

• easy_install -U mercurial
• If on a virtual server, you may need to install this in your home directory: easy_install –install-dir ~/lib/python/ -U mercurial

Install CGI script

• wget http://www.selenic.com/repo/hg-stable/raw-file/tip/hgwebdir.cgi
• mv hgwebdir.cgi index.cgi
• chmod 711 index.cgi

Configure CGI script

• edit index.cgi
• if you are using your own version of python, set it in line 1
• if necessary, add a path to the mercurial library:

import sys
sys.path.insert(0, "/path/to/mercurial")

Configure repositories

• edit hgweb.config

[paths]
reponame = /path/to/repo

If you don't already have a repository, make one with the command hg init, while in the directory /path/to/repo

Configure Access

• htpasswd -c /path/to/htpasswd
• Create file .htaccess

AuthUserFile /path/to/htpasswd
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName "Authentication Required"
AuthType Basic
Require valid-user

Configure repository access

• In /path/to/repo/.hg, edit hgrc
• Start the file with the line

[web]

• To let anyone push:

allow_push = *

• By default, https is required for pushes. To allow http:

push_ssl = false

Other

• Apache is fairly picky on permissions
• Make sure it has correct access to .htaccess, htpasswd and the repository

Testing

• Access is at http://web.server/dir/index.cgi.
• You can also test by running the cgi script directory on the command line.