Hi there!

The Titan Robotics Club is experimenting with tools to assist us with developing robot code this year, and we have some extra capability which we are willing to offer to other teams. We call our system the Code Tracker, and it provides two modern development tools: Subversion, a centralized version control system, and Trac, an online issue tracker.

Subversion is a version control system which helps teams organize their software development efforts and protect against nasty mistakes. Subversion is a centralized system which tracks how files are changed over time (versions), allowing developers to revert problematic changes and keep a single, up-to-date copy of their code in the online system.

If you have a couple minutes, I would highly recommend watching this video for a simple introduction to version control (YouTube: Subversion ), and/or reading this article (A Visual Guide to Version Control ).

Trac is an online issue tracking solution which helps guide a software development team. Users can log in to the system, then open, discuss, or close tickets (reports which indicate features which have not yet been implemented, features which don't operate as expected, and so forth). Developers can then work together to discuss the tickets, work on solutions, and work towards completing the goals defined for the next version of the software.

An excellent overview of the software can be found on the Trac website (Trac Features ), and a user guide can be found on their home page (http://trac.edgewall.org/ ).

A Word of Caution: This is the first year we have set up such a software system, and it remains experimental.The server providing these resources is quite modest; while most tasks using Subversion and Trac are rather lightweight, significant traffic may or may not bring down the system. We will do our best to ensure that the server keeps running quickly, but we may have to impose a limit on availability if performance becomes a problem.

Questions/Support/Guidance: Feel free to ask questions about how to use Subversion and/or Trac in this forum. My team and I will be monitoring it and we will do our best to assist anyone with questions as soon as possible.

How to sign up: If you are interested in a Subverion/Trac system, look at this post for further information about how to get started: http://www.firstwa.org/Forums/tabid/183/forumid/12/threadid/6/scope/posts/Default.aspx 

Thanks everyone, and happy coding!
  CEO, Titan Robotics Club 492