Email Notifications with Subversion

Pre-Flight

Running SubVersion 1.4.2 on CentOS 5.5 (x64)
For this guide, my repository is located at /home/svn/repository
I’ll be using mailer.py instead of commit-email.pl
- The former is more configurable and can be used on a
  per-directory basis. This is useful if you have many projects in
  a single repo.

Setup

Copy over the sample `post-commit` hook

Permissions and ownership are vitally important here!

cp hooks/post-commit.tmpl hooks/post-commit
chmod 770 hooks/post-commit
chown apache:apache hooks/post-commit

Now edit hooks/post-commit and add this line:

/usr/share/doc/subversion-1.4.2/tools/hook-scripts/mailer/mailer.py commit "$REPOS" "$REV"

Comment out these lines:

commit-email.pl "$REPOS" "$REV" commit-watchers@example.org
log-commit.py --repository "$REPOS" --revision "$REV"

Configure email alerts for a repository

First copy over the sample mailer config:

cp /usr/share/doc/subversion-1.4.2/tools/hook-scripts/mailer/mailer.conf.example conf/mailer.conf

A general file looks like this:

[general]
mail_command = /usr/sbin/sendmail
smtp_hostname = localhost

[defaults]
diff = /usr/bin/diff -u -L %(label_from)s -L %(label_to)s %(from)s %(to)s
commit_subject_prefix = "[SVN - IT Scripts]"
propchange_subject_prefix =
lock_subject_prefix =
unlock_subject_prefix =
from_addr = donotreply@svn.eng.uiowa.edu
to_addr = foo@uiowa.edu bar@gmail.com
reply_to = donotreply@svn.eng.uiowa.edu
generate_diffs = add copy modify
show_nonmatching_paths = yes
suppress_deletes = yes

[maps]

The various options should be self-explanatory. A test commit should work at this point.

Configuring alerts for specific folders

Let’s say that a specific group of people is to know if commits are made to the firewall_scripts folder. In that case:

[firewall_scripts]
for_paths = ^firewall_scripts($|/)
commit_subject_prefix = "[SVN - Firewall Scripts]"
from_addr = donotreply@svn.eng.uiowa.edu
to_addr = it-admins@genome.uiowa.edu

Testing things out

You don’t necessarily need to commit things to test out the config.

sh hooks/post-commit /home/svn/repository 195

Where the last two arguments are the path to the repo and the revision number.

Tip of the Iceberg

There are tons of things you can do with mailer.conf in a large and/or complicated setting. The best way to get acquainted with its features is to essentially read the default file to figure out what it’s capable of. Reading others’ config files also helps :)