Project files into RCS or not?

Question

In our company we have a discussion whether to put project files into our RCS. What do you think? Consider an Eclipse project file for a C project that contain source and make files and other things. Would you put it into RCS?

Answer 1

If the project files meet the following criteria:

1. They only contain information for building the source quickly, checkout, commit and the basic routines (for developers)
2. Parts maybe for release can be separated from internal only (if you are a FOSS project or proprietary, for example)
3. They don't change anyone's IDE setup or personal preferences
4. They can be treated like source code for internal-only releases, and may have their own bugs and patches

I don't see a major reason why not. Makefiles/autotools defs usually go in the RCS (autotools inputs at least). Providing the data stored is relevant to all, and their machines (build output directories ...) give it a go

Answer 2

I'd recommend checking them in unless they contain absolute paths (some ancient IDEs like Borland C++ Builder do that), or - like Aiden Bell wrote - they contain IDE setup info.

For example: with Eclipse, .project and .classpath are safe. With Visual Studio, *.csproj and *.sln are safe (whereas *.suo is not).

Answer 3

Id recommend to allways check them in. It wont cost you anything, but sometimes you run into situations where you will be happy to check i.e. different settings of project files etc.

Answer 4

If you're using RCS to mean a general revision control system, then, yes, check source and make files in, and in general pretty much anything that you can't easily recreate from what you've got checked in.

If you're using RCS to mean rcs, then please, PLEASE upgrade to something better. SVN would be a good choice, or Git or something like that.