Many CVS commands need certain command line switches to operate consistently. Rather than typing them every time that command is used, you can save the switches in a file that CVS will read before executing your command line.

Create a file named ~/.cvsrc in your home directory. It should contain the following commands, one per line:

cvs -z3
diff -uNp
rdiff -uNp
update -dP

If your goal is to download the various Fedora documents and to render them on your system, you only need read-only access to the CVS repository. Follow the instructions in this section and then skip directly to Section 8.4.1, “Checking Out Modules”.

Change directories to where you want your files from CVS to be located, and execute the following commands:

export CVSROOT=:pserver:anonymous@cvs.fedoraproject.org:/cvs/docs
cvs login
cvs checkout module-name
cvs checkout module-name
cd module-name

Once you have checked the module out, the value of your $CVSROOT environment variable does not matter. It is stored in the file CVS/Root for each directory in your local repository. As long as your current working directory has a CVS/ directory, the CVS program will automatically locate the Fedora Documentation Project repository.

To author a new document or to change an existing one, you must obtain full read/write access to the Fedora Documentation Project CVS repository. For the full details on this process, refer to the http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/DocsProject/Join web site.

Every author has a unique $CVSROOT to access the CVS repository:

export CVSROOT=:ext:yourname@cvs.fedoraproject.org:/cvs/docs
export CVS_RSH=/usr/bin/ssh

With the $CVSROOT and $CVS_RSH environment variables in place, you can access the repository:

cvs co -c

You will be asked for the passphrase for your SSH key. Press Enter to receive a list of modules already in the repository.