CVS is free AFAIK. We use it here, although we need to upgrade.
There was a good thread on the Discreet forum last summer about this, but it looks like it’s gone now. I saved some of it on my HD, here are the pertinent bits…
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Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (1 of 8), Read 86 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Petr Novak](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?22460) Date: Monday, May 31, 2004 06:46 AM
Please, is there someone who has an experience with working on a game project as an artist? Is there a version history software suitable for graphic team? I mean software capable of blocking files for single user for some time, making backups of graphic data (binary mostly) or saving history comments?
I only heard about CVS. Is it suitable for grafic data? Is there any other software better than this one? The simplier the better. Thanks a lot
Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (2 of 8), Read 67 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Harry Dechering](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?46) Date: Tuesday, June 01, 2004 12:24 AM
I’ve worked with SourceSafe, and although it did the trick, it didn’t work as ‘smooth’ as one would hope.
Harry.
Harry Dechering III
www.harrydechering.com
Topic:
Version history software for graphic team? (3 of 8), Read 63 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Logan Foster](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?256) Date: Tuesday, June 01, 2004 09:50 AM
I have heard that SourceSafe (at least the easlier versions of it) had issues with corrupting binary files sometimes as well as various issues with crashing and recovery problems. Is this still true or did Microsoft solve that problem in the later versions?
Note: My only experiance is with CVS, thus far its fairly decent though a pain for artists to work with as anything more than a backup or sharing tool.
Logan
Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (4 of 8), Read 61 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [David Lanier](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?21413) Date: Tuesday, June 01, 2004 02:20 PM
Hi,
Here are some of the data and source code management I know in the video games industry for graphical data :
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Microsoft source Safe V6 works fine for graphical content while it was not designed for binary files as it stores a difference between versions of the same file in ascii format so it’s not very efficient with binary files. But it works and it’s included with visual Studio .NET enterprise edition and above (as far as I know).
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Alienbrain NxN has been designed for binary and ascii files so it’s fine too. I have used it with 3d graphics content (Max files) and bitmap files and source code under visual studio 6 successfully. http://www.alienbrain.com
Alienbrain company is now the property of Avid (Softimage, XSI…)
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Perforce is probably one of the best data management software. And anyway, it’s the one everyone is talking about those times in the video games industry 
http://www.perforce.com
This web site also contains a comparison between Perforce and Clearcase, CVS, PCVS, Visual Source Safe which is said to be made by an independent consulting group… Visible on http://www.perforce.com/perforce/reviews.html
It can be a good starting point for you to compare things. I suppose the study is advantageous for Perforce but you can visit the web sites of its competitors directly
Hope this helps.
Regards,
David Lanier
3D Tools Senior Developer
http://www.dl3d.com
Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (6 of 8), Read 55 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Sami Vanhatalo](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?2609) Date: Friday, June 04, 2004 05:47 PM
I can highly recommend Perforce. It’s VERY robust, it’s VERY fast.
We were in SourceSafe land before, it worked fine but was just slow (we never got a single corrupted binary file despite the urban legends). We evaluated Alienbrain and CVS/Subversion. Alienbrain was just too buggy (and slow) and CVS was just too slow and lacked exclusive check-out.
Perforce’s UI is a bit quirky, but our artists have gotten to it pretty easily.
SamiV.
Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (7 of 8), Read 45 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Seb Paul](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?1235) Date: Tuesday, June 08, 2004 02:20 PM
hi,
here are two more (free btw)
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Subversion, which is the next generation version control tool from the same team behind CVS http://subversion.tigris.org/ (but I suspect it is more programmer oriented) (it comes in a tortoise version as well).
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Sourcegear Vault, the evaluation is free for a single user http://www.sourcegear.com/vault/index.asp (heard some great comments about this one, but be sure to test it).
rgds.
seb.
Topic: Version history software for graphic team? (8 of 8), Read 6 times Conf: [Game development](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/confintro?191) From: [Jeff Hanna](file://Portal/Content/Apps/Art_Tutorials/Production/userpeek?776) Date: Friday, August 20, 2004 07:30 AM
I can’t recommend Perforce enough, personally.
I’ve written a collection of MaxScripts that integrate Perforce directly into 3dsmax. You can get them from the scripts section of my website, http://www.jeff-hanna.com. The scripts work with Max 4.2 and later.
Jeff Hanna
Technical Artist, Mythic Entertainment
