Other SVN Errors

Subversion error messages and how to resolve them.

• Why do I get random "Access Denied" errors on Windows?
  These appear to be due to the various Windows services that monitor the filesystem for changes (anti-virus software, indexing services, the COM+ Event Notification Service).
• Why doesn't svn switch work in some cases?
  In some cases if there are unversioned or ignored items in the working copy, svn switch can produce an error. The switch stops, leaving the working copy half-switched.
• Why can't I see the log entry for the file I just committed?
  Assume you run svn checkout on a repository and receive a working copy at revision 7 (aka, r7) with one file in it called foo.c. You modify the file and commit it successfully. Two things happen: The repository moves to r8 on the server and in your working copy, only the file foo.c moves to r8. The rest of your working copy remains at r7.
• After upgrading to Berkeley DB 4.3 and later, I'm seeing repository errors and svnadmin recover fails.
  Prior to Berkeley DB 4.3, svnadmin recover worked to upgrade a Berkeley DB repository in-place. However, due to a change in the behavior of Berkeley DB in version 4.3, this now fails. Use this procedure to upgrade your repository in-place to Berkeley DB 4.3 or later:
• Why do I get occasional, inconsistent errors when checking out over http from a repository running on MacOS X 10.4 (Tiger)?
  There is a bug in APR 0.9.6 that is present when it is running on Tiger, and shows up when you attempt to check out a file larger than 64Kb.
• Why do I get "already under version control" when I try to add a new file to a directory?
  The directory you're trying to add already contains a.svn subdirectory, but it's from a different repository than the directory to which you're trying to add it.
• I got an error saying "This client is too old to work with working copy '...'. " How can I fix it without upgrading Subversion?
  Upgrade your command-line client to 1.4 or newer.
• Why do I receive the error "volume label syntax is incorrect" when I checkout from a Windows client?
  Some characters are reserved and cannot be used as part of a filename.
• Why do I get "path not found" when trying to view an old version of my file?
  The workaround for all problems of this sort is to do the legwork yourself to find the file history as detailed below.
• Why does Subversion say my working copy is out of date when I try to commit?
  Three kinds of situations can cause this: 1) Debris from a failed commit is littering your working copy; 2) Mixed revisions; 3) You might be genuinely out of date. The solution depends on your circumstances.
• Why do I get an "unrecognized URL scheme" error when I try to check out Subversion after building the distribution binary?
  The error you are seeing means that the dynamic linker/loader can't find the plugins to load.
• Why does my --diff-cmd complain about -u when I try to override it with --extensions?
  When using an external diff command, Subversion builds a fairly complicated command line. If your preferred diff command does not support these arguments, you may need to create a small wrapper script to discard arguments and just use the last couple file paths.
• Why does mod_dav_svn complain about a bad database version when I start Apache? It found db-3.X, rather than db-4.X.
  Your apr-util linked against DB-3, and svn linked against DB-4. Unfortunately, the DB symbols aren't different.
• When I run configure, I get errors about subs-1.sed line 38: Unterminated 's' command. What's wrong?
  You probably have old copies of /usr/local/bin/apr-config and /usr/local/bin/apu-config on your system. Remove them, make sure the apr/ and apr-util/ that you're building with are completely up-to-date, and try again.
• My repository keeps giving errors "Cannot allocate memory". What should I do?
  It usually means that a Berkeley DB repository has run out of database locks (this does not happen with FSFS repositories). It shouldn't happen in the course of normal operations, but if it does, the solution is to run database recovery as described here. If it happens often, you probably need to raise the default lock parameters (set_lk_max_locks, set_lk_max_lockers, and set_lk_max_objects) in the db/DB_CONFIG file. When changing DB_CONFIG in an existing repository, remember to run recovery afterwards.
• My repository seems to get stuck, giving me DB_RUNRECOVERY errors. What could be the cause?
  The Berkeley DB database in your repository is sensitive to interruptions. If a process accessing the database exits without "cleanly" closing the environment, then the database is left in an inconsistent state. Common causes of this include: the process exiting when it hits a permission problem the process crashing/segfaulting the process being forcibly killed running out of disk space.
• I'm getting the error "svn: bdb: call implies an access method which is inconsistent with previous calls". How do I fix this?
  Berkeley DB 4.1 has shown itself to be rather unstable - both 4.0 and 4.2 are better. This error message is a symptom of one unique way in which 4.1 will sometimes break.
• I'm trying to use mod_dav_svn with Apache on Win32 and I'm getting an error saying that the module cannot be found, yet the mod_dav_svn.so file is right there in \Apache\modules.
  The error message in this case is a little misleading. Most likely Apache is unable to load one or more DLLs that mod_dav_svn.so relies on. If Apache is running as a service, it will not have the same PATH as a regular user. Make sure that libdb4*.dll, intl3_svn.dll, libeay32.dll and ssleay32.dll are present in either \Apache\bin or \Apache\modules. You can copy them from your Subversion installation directory if they are not there.
• Under Windows XP, the Subversion server sometimes seems to send out corrupted data. Is this really happening?
  You need to install Window XP Service Pack 1. You can get all sorts of information about that Service Pack in the link below.
• VS.NET/ASP.NET seems to have a problem with the ".svn" directory name. What should I do?
  VS.Net has a subsystem called ASP.Net, which uses WebDAV to do remote publishing through IIS. This subsystem rejects any pathname that starts with ".", which causes a problem when you try to remotely publish a Subversion working copy, because of the ".svn" subdirectories. The error message says something like "unable to read project information".
• Why aren't my repository hooks working? They're supposed to invoke external programs, but the invocations never seem to happen.
  Before Subversion calls a hook script, it removes all variables - including $PATH on Unix, and %PATH% on Windows - from the environment. Therefore, your script can only run another program if you spell out that program's absolute name.
• Why doesn't HTTP Digest auth work?
  This is probably due to a known bug in Apache HTTP Server (versions 2.0.48 and earlier), for which a patch is available. See the links below for more information.
• Why am I getting "Can't open file" and "system cannot find the file specified" errors when I try to check out a repository?
  This is typically due to a virus scanner on the client machine interfering with the checkout. Try disabling the virus scanner and try the checkout again.