Subversive: try performing 'cleanup'

Submitted by litrik on

Earlier today I was struggling with Subversion in my Eclipse installation. I'm using Subversive 2.0.4 with the SVNKit 1.5 Implementation in Eclipse 3.4. When I tried to add a directory to version control using the Team > Add to Version Control... menu item, an error occurred.

*** Add to Version Control
svn add "/home/litrik/workspace/be.norio.drupal/build/lib"
svn: Working copy '/home/litrik/workspace/be.norio.drupal/build' locked;
     try performing 'cleanup'
*** Error (took 00:00.010)

When I tried to run cleanup using the Team > Cleanup menu item, this error was logged:

*** Cleanup
svn cleanup "/home/litrik/workspace/be.norio.drupal/build"
svn: Error processing command 'modify-entry' in
     '/home/litrik/workspace/be.norio.drupal/build'
svn: Error modifying entry for 'lib'
svn: 'lib' is not under version control
*** Error (took 00:01.023)

A does not work. Try B. B does not work. Do A first. Ad infinitum.

I decided to switch to Ubuntu's command line svn client, hoping that it would allow to get me out of this deadlock. When I went into the /home/litrik/workspace/be.norio.drupal/build and entered the svn cleanup command another error was shown:

svn: This client is too old to work with working copy '.';
     please get a newer Subversion client

Apparently the subversion client included in Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy) is version 1.4.6. My Eclipse Subversive plug-in is already using 1.5. After installing the 1.5 subversion command line client using these instructions I was able to run the svn cleanup command and switch back to Eclipse to add the directory to version control. All's well that ends well.

I still wonder how I ended up in that deadlock situation in the first place...

Topic: 

8 Comments

I've had the same problem

Submitted by Wim Leers on

I've had the same problem when I was trying to add a file to my repository that was owned by a different user. Since I didn't have chown nor sudo on that server, I was … screwed. I managed to fix it by moving the original file, then copying it to the original filename and then adding that instead, but only *after* removing the .svn file and running an svn up… But the problem propagated all the way up to the root of my working copy! :O
I don't remember how I fixed that part. Believe me when I say it cost me hours of fiddling.

SVN is great as long as you don't try tricky stuff. Once you get into that, you're on your own.

@Pascal: actually Subclipse

Submitted by Anonymous on

@Pascal: actually Subclipse is just as bad. The entire svn versioning system seems completely screweed, to me. It might be okay if the version numbers always meant the same thing, but they don't, for example Subclipse 1.4 only works with SVN 1.5. Retarded.

Had the same problem: No

Submitted by Smotricz on

Had the same problem: No operation in Subversive would make SVN workable on a certain dir; it was both "not under version control" and "locked".

Thankfully, my Ubuntu box is fully updated so my command-line SVN client was too. "svn cleanup" worked right off the bat, quickly and quietly. Problem solved.

Thanks for the tip!