Tools for participating in Free Software

This course covers tools for participating in Free Software and related development. This will *mostly* be course about version control systems, but some of the earlier lessons will cover other things.

The version control lessons will focus on two things: an overview of concepts, followed by examples in three separate version control systems. This will be hands on, as in you will actually get practise working using a revision control system.

To follow the course, subscribe to the courses mailing list and make sure that you're following *at least* the "Participating in Free Software" topic.

Lessons

• Introduction and overview
• Ways you can contribute to Free Software (code, documentation, user help, artwork...)
• Coordination tools: bug trackers and mailing lists
• Community tools: Chat programs, blogging and conferences.
• an introduction to version control 1: what problem does it solve?
• an introduction to version control 2: concepts (versions, checking out, committing, respositories)
• introduction to our three VCSs: CVS, Subversion and Bazaar (version 2)
• Sat Nov 5 2005: checking out, making a change, and committing it
• Sat Nov 19 2005: conflicts: what happens when your changes clash?
• Sat Dec 3 2005: setting up your own repository
• Sat Dec 17 2005: simple distributed version control with Bazaar