Re: scm tasks able to use tags?

Hi,

> Reading through the documentation, I see where scm repositories are
> specified and used, but no mention about tags/branches.  Does anyone
> know if capistrano can use branch or tag names when checking out code
> from a repository, rather than just head?

Yes, it can.  Just set the repository to the location you want.

For example:

set :repository, "svn+ssh://path/to/your/app/branches/RB-1.2.3"

> Ideally, I'd love to see the branch/tag name used in the naming of
> subdirectories of the "releases" directory that capistrano manages, so
> we're able to tell what "version" of code was used for a particular
> release.  Ensuring each release is built from a known label (branch or
> tag, of which i prefer tags) solves for lots of troubleshooting issues
> and makes the process that much more reliable and repeatable.

Capistrano doesn't do this as-is but there's no reason why you can't  
create the exact behaviour you want by writing a few custom tasks.   
Capistrano has a wonderfully open design so it should be  
straightforward for you to customise its behaviour.

I'm sure you aren't the first person to want to do this so you may  
well find somebody else has already done it and made their deployment  
recipe available on the web.

Regards,
Andy Stewart

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http://airbladesoftware.com