Is there an Eclipse plugin that allows you to split a single Java method into multiple versions of Subversion?

Question

We are at the stage of fixing project errors. I am trying to fix a function that regressed once in the last 2 months. I think I highlighted the problem for one method of the Java class. Ideally, I would like to compare how this method has evolved over the past 5 or 10 Subversion transactions.

Are there any tools that understand Java and Subversion well to visualize the evolution of a method in multiple transactions? I present an extension for the Subversive Eclipse module.

I am looking for something besides string / character comparison. Svn blame / show annotations does not understand that the text being analyzed is Java code that has methods. Are there any tools that are visualized with this understanding?

Something similar to the Motive tool described in this article ... 2007. Visualization of the evolution of software architecture using change sets. Andrew McNair, Daniel M. Herman and Jens Weber-Janke, Computer Science Division, University of Victoria, Victoria, Canada, {amcnair, dmg, jens} @ cs.uvic.ca http://turingmachine.org/~dmg/papers/ dmg2007_wcre_changesets.pdf

Answer 1

In any case, try a few different SVN clients: you can find something better for your needs than if you limited yourself to Eclipse.

Here are a few options:

http://liquidat.wordpress.com/2008/08/24/short-tip-compare-revisions-with-svn/

http://www.svnforum.org/threads/37499-graphical-tools-for-svn-diff

And I suspect you are already using this:

http://subclipse.tigris.org/

Here are some additional tips and tricks for using the Subclipse SVN client:

http://ist.berkeley.edu/as-ag/tools/usage/subclipse-usage-tips.html

http://www.clear.rice.edu/comp310/Eclipse/Subclipse/

'Hope this helps!

Answer 2

I have never seen anything you describe, but “blaming svn” may help. For each line in a particular version, it shows the latest version where that line was changed. This is called Show Annotations in Subclipse.