There are a couple of ways to keep your WordPress install up-to-date. The easiest way is to install it as an svn:external. In the root of your (Subversioned) site:

svn propedit svn:externals .

Then paste in:

wordpress http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress/tags/[current_tag_number]

Replacing [current_tag_number] with the current tag number (check wordpress.org/download/ to see the latest). Alternately, you can just download WordPress and put it in a wordpress folder (or wp or whatever you prefer) in the root of your site.

Now copy the default wp-content folder from the fresh copy of WordPress to the root of your site:

cp -R wordpress/wp-content .

Delete the existing .svn folders from your fresh new wp-content.

cd wp-content
rm -rf `find . -type d -name .svn`

Now create your wp-config.php

cd ..
cp wordpress/wp-config-sample.php wp-config.php

Edit the file and add your database info. While you’re in there, add these settings to the top of the file:

// Custom wp-content folder: 
define('WP_CONTENT_DIR', $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] . '/wp-content' );
define('WP_CONTENT_URL', 'http://' . $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] . '/wp-content');

define('WP_HOME', 'http://' . $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] . '');
define('WP_SITEURL', 'http://' . $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] . '/wordpress');

Those settings do a number of cool things. First, you’re allowing WordPress to use your fresh copy of wp-content in the root of your site instead of the one that lives inside of the wordpress folder. Second, you’re specifically setting some WordPress variables that are normally defined in its database in PHP, so that you won’t have to readjust your settings between development (on your local machine) and where it lives in the wild. Third, you’re telling WordPress where to find it’s core files since you’ve put them in a subfolder (/wordpress).

Now copy index.php from WordPress to the root of your site:

cp wordpress/index.php .

Edit the file and change the line that says:

require('./wp-blog-header.php');

To this:

require('./wordpress/wp-blog-header.php');

If you want fancy URLs (you do), create an .htaccess file:

touch .htaccess
chmod 666 .htaccess

Duplicate the default theme:

cp -R wp-content/themes/default wp-content/themes/[your_new_theme]

Replacing [your_new_theme] with what you want your new theme to be called.

Bonus: keep Akismet as an svn:external for automatic updates from Automattic.

cd wp-content/plugins/
rm -rf akismet

Or, if you’re already committed your code:

svn rm akismet
svn ci -m "Moving Akismet to external."

Then setup the external link:

svn propedit svn:externals .

Paste in:

akismet http://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/akismet/trunk/

That’s it.

Now commit your code and get to it. If you get lost, check out wp-template for an example.

Updating WordPress

svn propedit svn:externals .

Change the tag number, then svn update and you’re good to go.

If you’re not using svn:externals, just dump a new copy of WordPress over the one that’s already in /wordpress. There’s no way you can hurt your existing content, because that’s all in the /wp-content folder in the root of your site.

Sources

• Installing/Updating WordPress with Subversion
• Changing File Permissions
• Recursively delete .svn directories
• Editing wp-config.php
• WP Config
• Giving WordPress its own Directory

http://code.yourmom.com/project/trunk/

Issue this command (note that you leave off trunk/):

git svn clone -s http://code.yourmom.com/project/ project

After it’s done, see how big it is:

du -hs project

And you’ll see something like this:

20M project/

If it’s particularly big, go into the folder and garbage collect:

cd project
git gc

From within the project folder, set your local repository to the trunk (it’s set to whatever branch had the last commit otherwise):

git reset --hard trunk

Create your own branch and get to work:

git co -b treys_changes

When you want to pull in the changes from the original author to stay up to date:

git svn rebase

If you’ve cloned this repo (after posting it to GitHub or elsewhere) and want to use it on another computer, you’ll have to use do more step in order to track the original SVN repo again:

git update-ref refs/remotes/trunk origin/master
git svn init -T trunk http://code.yourmom.com/project/

Sources

• Brian Rosner’s Using git with Django Screencast
• Pieter on #github
• WebKit wiki (via Pieter)

mkdir svn_setup
cd svn_setup

Create the standard SVN folder structure.

mkdir tags
mkdir branches

Create a new Rails project and rename it to be the trunk folder.

rails project_name
mv project_name trunk

The reason to do this is so your database.yml file (among others) will have the right project name instead of trunk_development, etc.

A little housekeeping before putting the files into the repository.

cd trunk
rm -r tmp/*
rm -r log/*
mv config/database.yml config/database_example.yml

Put the files into the repository.

cd ..
svn import . svn_project_url -m "initial import of blank Rails project" --username whathaveyou

Checkout the files and tell Subversion to ignore some files.

cd ..
svn co svn_project_url/trunk project_name
cd project_name
cp config/database_example.yml config/database.yml
svn propset svn:ignore database.yml config/
svn propset svn:ignore "*" log/
svn propset svn:ignore "*" tmp/

If you want, setup Rails with svn:externals to that it will be ready for you to lock it into a particular version for stability.

svn propedit svn:externals vendor/

In the file that pops up, enter this (or enter whatever version you want to use–such as http://dev.rubyonrails.org/svn/rails/trunk/ for edge):

rails http://dev.rubyonrails.org/svn/rails/tags/rel_1-2-3/

Save then close the file.

Check the changes back into the repository.

svn ci -m "Ignore database.yml, log/, and temp/.  Set up Rails with svn:extnrnals"

Then update your checkout to get the Rails external to load.

svn up

Other things:

When you’re done with everything you can delete the svn_setup folder. I think I’m going to keep mine around for a slight head start on more projects.

Don’t forget to use the -c option when you run script/generate to automatically add the files to Subversion.

script/generate scaffold_resource angryfarmer name:string bales_of_hay:integer -c

When installing plugins, use the -x option to make it an svn:external

script/plugin install -x robot_cow

Source

• Railscasts – Subversion on Rails
• rails svn:externals for plugins and rails edge
• JTJ’s comment below

Update (November 1, 2006): It really works. I’ve got all 3 of my blogs (one two three) now set up on SVN. The next step will to be when I add my customized themes to Subversion so all I ever have to do is go to the command line to do anything. No (s)FTP or anything. I imagine this will make switching servers really easy now.

Update (January 23, 2007): To upgrade to WordPress 2.1:

1. Disable all plugins (take a screenshot first)
2. Run this command:

svn switch http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress/branches/2.1/

1. Go to your admin screen and update the database when prompted.
2. Enable your plugins again.

Update (May 22, 2007): Just upgraded to version 2.2