Svn+ssh with Subclipse

Posted: April 10, 2012

Subversion supports several protocols: http, https, svn and svn+ssh. I don't like using http for Subversion, since the username and password are transmitted as plain text. Getting https to work, you need to get a certificate from a Certificate Authority. This takes time and costs money. The svn+ssh alternative can be quickly set up and is for free. The application svnserve allows access to your Subversion repositories using the svn protocol.

I installed Subversion on my Ubuntu server. An excellent description on how to do this is available here.

cd /etc/init.d/
sudo touch svnserve
sudo vi svnserve
svnserve -d -r /usr/local/svn/repository_name

The only thing left is to get Subclipse to work with your Subversion repository. All I had to do was to go to Windows -> Preferences -> SVN and change the client to SVNKit (Pure Java).

On the Internet I found another way to get JavaHL work with svn+ssh. However, I experienced that configuring a private key was much easier with SVNKit than with JavaHL. So I will stick to SVNKit.