Add description to folders/files and extract descriptions

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J. Bertels

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May 20, 2022, 5:59:16 AM5/20/22
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Hi all,

We are looking for a way (or the best way) to add descriptions to folders (i.e. what does it contain) and files (i.e. what does it do and what is it used for). 
This information should be exportable in an overview, so it can be used to check the contents of a folder and its subfolders for users who are unfamiliar with the project or looking for something.

Does anyone know a way or perhaps the best way to do this?

Thank you in advance!

Kind regards,
Jonas Bertels
Belgium

Bruce C

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May 20, 2022, 6:28:01 AM5/20/22
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A very simply solution would be to create a ReadMe file for each folder, either as a simple text format or Markdown format [https://www.markdownguide.org/]. This could describe the purpose of the folder. However, that wouldn't include a dynamic list of the files in the folder.

Alternatively, if you are documenting source code, perhaps you could use a documentation tool (e.g. Doxygen [https://doxygen.nl/index.html]). That particular tool has a command [https://www.doxygen.nl/manual/commands.html#cmddir] to document the containing folder.

Neither of these solutions is especially related to Subversion. Given that you've asked the question here, perhaps you had specific Subversion capabilities that you wanted to consider further. If you are more specific, perhaps someone will have suggestions that relate more to Subversion.

Hope this helps.

Daniel Sahlberg

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May 22, 2022, 4:21:39 PM5/22/22
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A more Subversion-ish solution would be to add custom Properties (see the description in the SVN book [1]) to the folders to store the descriptions. They fit a literal interpretation of being "exportable", for example using the command line client svn proplist -v [folder]. Depending on your client and server they may be more or less visible for the users.

Kind regards,
Daniel

J. Bertels

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Jun 8, 2022, 4:08:56 AM6/8/22
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Thank you Bruce and Daniel for providing a solution! We will look into both suggestions later on. If we end up using a solution, I will provide feedback on our experience. 

Meanwhile, if anyone has more ideas of if anyone has already implemented a workflow to do this, feel free to share as well!

Op zondag 22 mei 2022 om 22:21:39 UTC+2 schreef daniel.l...@gmail.com:
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