[ensembl-dev] Ensembl Migration to Git

[Andy Yates]

Dear all,

Over a year ago we emailed to announce our investigations into changing Ensembl’s chosen version control system. After much time, effort and discussion I can announce that Ensembl will migrate to Git [1] on the 16th December 2013; approx. two weeks after our 74 release. 

Ensembl release 75 will be the first release on Git.

The migration will see:

	• Ensembl’s source code being distributed via GitHub [2]
	• A full export of Ensembl’s CVS history into Git
	• 3 releases will continue to be available from CVS (ending with release 77)
	• A discontinuation of supported repositories on cvs.sanger.ac.uk after this date
	• Ensembl distributions such as our FTP tarball will continue to be provided

CVS has served us well for over 14 years. However we have seen other projects within EMBL-EBI and Sanger make a similar transition to Git. None of them have looked back citing better tooling, a larger support base and an ability to support both long-term and short-term development branches. We agree and cannot wait to start using this exciting technology. 

We hope you also find this change as exciting as we do and look for our new repositories available from https://github.com/ensembl 

Best regards,

Andy Yates 

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_(software)
[2] https://github.com/ 

------------
Andrew Yates - Ensembl Core Software Project Leader
European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI)
European Molecular Biology Laboratory
Wellcome Trust Genome Campus
Hinxton
Cambridge CB10 1SD
Tel: +44-(0)1223-492538
Fax: +44-(0)1223-494468
http://www.ensembl.org/