Section 14.7. Providing Remote Access: svnserve

14.7. Providing Remote Access: svnserve

svnserve allows access to Subversion repositories using the svn network protocol. You can run svnserve either as a standalone server process, or by having another processsuch as inetd, xinetd, or sshd--start it for you.

Once the client has selected a repository by transmitting its URL, svnserve reads a file named conf/svnserve.conf in the repository directory to determine repository-specific settings, such as what authentication database to use and what authorization policies to apply. The details are provided in Version Control with Subversion (O'Reilly).

14.7.1. svnserve Options

Unlike the previous commands we've described, svnserve has no subcommands; svnserve is controlled exclusively by options.

--daemon, -d

Run in daemon mode. svnserve backgrounds itself, and accepts and serves TCP/IP connections on the svn port (3690, by default).

--foreground

When used together with -d, this option causes svnserve to stay in the foreground. This option is mainly useful for debugging.

--help, -h

Display a usage summary and exit.

--inetd, -i

Use the standard input/standard output file descriptors, as appropriate for a server running out of inetd.

--listen-host=host

Listen on the interface specified by host, which may be either a hostname or an IP address.

--listen-once, -X

Accept one connection on the svn port, serve it, and exit. This option is mainly useful for debugging.

--listen-port=port

Listen on port when run in daemon mode.

--root=root, -r=root

Set the virtual root for repositories served by svnserve to root. The pathname in URLs provided by the client are interpreted relative to this root and are not allowed to escape this root.

--threads, -T

When running in daemon mode, spawn a thread instead of a process for each connection. The svnserve process still backgrounds itself at startup time.

--tunnel, -t

Run in tunnel mode, which is just like the inetd mode of operation (serve one connection over standard input/standard output), except that the connection is considered to be pre-authenticated with the username of the current UID. This flag is selected by the client when running over a tunnelling agent such as ssh.