On Tue, Nov 27, 2012 at 10:51 AM, armando.perico.n...@usi.ch < armando.perico.n...@usi.ch> wrote:
> Hi Andy, > > you are probably right if we think only about code and software projects; > however, the needs for these features here are to control "documentation > projects" i.e.: to handle documents for ISOs and IECs standard > implementation (we pretty much handle .doc files - no need to handle line > diffs and merges for instance). > > Note: An important requirement here is that the path of the document shall > never change once it has been defined and published internally. > > Some uses cases: > - Only create a "release" versions of the documentation when all the > documents are with the "approved" status. > - Only specific author can make revisions > - A document cannot be "approved" if it has not been "reviewed" and so > on... > > I am not comfortable yetwith the solution we're planning to use in order > to solve this, however, it seems to be the solution with less "side-effect" > to the users (once SVN is already used as a repository system for the > documents). > > I am still trying to put the ideas together to come up with a good > solution. I am open to suggestions... > > I would suggest that you look at something other than SVN, to be perfectly honest. What you're really looking for is a document management system. In your original post you said "source code repository", but now you're talking about managing MS Office files - there's quite a bit of difference there! A good DMS will manage workflow, versioning, status tracking, etc.You can coerce SVN to do this & build a DMS on top of it, just as people have built things like this using MS Outlook's Shared Folders, or Lotus Notes as a base, but there are other tools that are more appropriate & better-tuned to document management requirements. If you're heavily invested in Microsoft already, start your search with SharePoint.