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Question: I've compiled and installed cvstrac 1.1.2 on RedHat 7.3 as a cgi install with Apache, and am getting to the point where I enter in my 'setup' username and password at:

http://www.mydomain.com/cgi-bin/cvstrac/myproject/

when I do this, I get this:

  Query failed
  Database query failed: 

  BEGIN;DELETE FROM cookie WHERE expires<=%d;INSERT INTO cookie
  (cookie,user,expires,ipaddr,agent) VALUES('%q','%q',%d,'%q','%q');COMMIT;
  Reason: attempt to write a readonly database

when I update the file permissions on the db file (in my case located at /home/cvsroot/myproject.db) so that they are world-readable/writable, the last line of the error changes to:

  Reason: unable to open database file

Any suggestions? Seems like a problem with permissions between the webserver and sqlite? Any pointers on how to proceed would be appreciated.

Answer:


Question: I compiled and installed CVStrac 1.1.2 on FreeBSD4.3. I initialized cvs with: cvstrac init /home/cvs demo and started cvstrac as its own webserver: cvstrac server 8008 /home/cvs When I activate CVStrac from the browser with URL: http://ptscvs.proeftuin.pts.nl:8008/demo I get the CVStrac login page on which I only see the "user id" and "pwd" select boxes and "login" button. Furthermore there is a "CVSTrac version 1.1.2" hyperlink which prompts with the "about" page. Although this seems all okay, I have the idea that I'm missing hyperlinks in the page header. Furthermore I have no idea how to configure CVStrac with CVS users and where CVStrac finds the CVS repository. Does it use environment variable $CVSROOT or expects it having directory CVSROOT located somewhere in /home/cvs?

Answer: Read and follow the CvstracInstallation instructions.


Question: Is there a way to display last updated date on any wiki page? I'm trying to use this within my organisation, and although the concept is being welcomed, yet its pretty tedious to go thru all the wiki pages and manually check for any modifications on that page. Any pointers will be appreciated.

Answer: You can generate a report that shows the time of last modification for all wiki pages. See the example at http://cvs.cvstrac.org/rptview?rn=17.

You can also get a summary of all wiki pages changes by selecting appropriate configuration on the timeline. Or you can see a history of changes for a particular wiki pages by clicking on the "[History]" hyperlink in the upper right-hand corner when viewing that page.


Question: Can CVSTrac be run in a chroot jail?

Answer: See ChrootJailForCvstrac.


Question: I don't want CVSTrac to change my CVSROOT/passwd file. How do I keep it from changing that file when I add new users to CVSTrac?

Answer: CVSTrac will not change the CVSROOT/passwd file if you turn off write permission on that file. You can also configure CVSTrac not to write to CVSROOT/passwd in one of the setup screens.


Question: I have multiple projects in the same CVS repository. How can I set of separate CVSTrac instances for each project?

Answer: You can configure CVSTrac so that it only sees CVS files that have a particular prefix. If each project has a unique prefix, you can set up multiple CVSTrac servers, one for each project.


Question: I want my tickets to start at #0. How can I achieve it?

Answer: You can't. Tickets start with #1. There is no way to change this.


Question: How and when should the database update be done? Automatically after every checkin or with a cron job (at what interval?) ?

Answer: The database is updated automatically from the CVSROOT/history file whenever anyone accesses the timeline page. The last known size of CVSROOT/history is saved (in the CONFIG table of the database) and if the current size is larger, the excess is scanned and entered as new records in the change log. All of this should occur automatically and without any intervention on the part of either the user or the administrator.


Question: How does CVSTrac work from the cvs checkin perspective? Are users required to add certain text to checkin comments in order for tickets to be related to checkins?

Answer: If the user includes a ticket number preceeded by a "#" somewhere in the check-in comment, then CVSTrac will automatically associate that ticket with the check-in. But this association can be broken, or new asssocations added, by editing the ticket and changing the list of check-in numbers in the "Associated Check-ins:" entry box.


Question: Whatever I try (on a cgi install) of cvstrac, I am unable to "browse" the repository. I have no special xinetd or inetd settings.. am I in some sort of chroot jail? All other functions seem to work.. just not "browse the code". I have tried setting the directory to many different things (in setup). I can't for the life of me figure out what I'm missing.

Answer: CVSTrac only sees files that have been "commit"-ed at least once. Did you fill your repository with "import" and thus avoid doing any commits? Another possibility is that the user that CGI scripts run as does not have read permission for the CVS files.


Question: How can I get 1.1.1-SNAP via CVS?

Answer: There was a configuration problem on the CVSTrac website that prevent access to the lastest CVS changes. But that problem has now been fixed. To download the latest changes to CVS, do this:

   cvs -d :pserver:anonymous@cvs.cvstrac.org:/cvstrac login 
   cvs -d :pserver:anonymous@cvs.cvstrac.org:/cvstrac checkout cvstrac 

The password is "anonymous".


Question: How do I use Milestones? So far I have defined a milestone, and I have associated tickets with it by entering the milestone's checkin number in the "associated checkins" field of the ticket. But ... how is this useful? Maybe somebody could enlighten me on how Milestones are supposed to be used?

Answer: If you change the type of the Milestone from "Event" to "Release", then a pink box appears on the timeline at the point of that milestone. This is useful for delimiting significant events in the history of a project (such as releases). Note that you have to check the "Divide Timeline by Milestones" box at the bottom of the timeline page for this to happen.

Event milestones are automatically created for each tag that you insert using the normal CVS tag commands. This is just to give visibility to tags.


Question: We have added an estimated effort field. Neat. We have created a report that shows 'total estimated effort', 'completed effort' and 'pending effort'. Also neat.

We'd like to be able to keep track of the evolution of these values. Any ideas to help us to track them are welcomed. (Not CVSTrac related, but would also like to hear some ideas about how to plot the evolution of the estimated effort).

Answer:


Question: Has anyone thought about porting CVSTrac to use Subversion (http://subversion.tigris.org/) as the back-end? (SvnTrac?)

Answer:


Question: I am also unable to "browse" the repository.All other functions seem to work. And I don't know what "commit"-ed mean? How can I fill my repository not with "import" ?

Answer: CVSTrac only knows about files that appear in the CVSROOT/history log. The "cvs import" command does not make entries in this log. Only the "cvs commit" command does. Hence you can only see files that have been processed by "cvs commit", not just "cvs import".


Question: I receive lots of "The file x could not be found" errors when I run reconstruct from the CVS history file. What could be wrong?

Answer: If you have done any manual surgery on your CVS repository, such as moving ,v files in the repository, this change will not be reflected in the CVS history file. So check the filenames carefully, as these errors will likely refer to files which no longer exist in that exact location. It is likely that your import was still successful.