Advanced: Using a repository to track local changes to Drupal code

Note: many people use subversion (SVN) as their local repository even though drupal.org uses CVS. Hopefully someone will writeup the process here

Note: The following assumes you have both basic knowledge of CVS and your own local repository set up and working.

If you've been modifying the Drupal source code for your own purposes (or developing a module or theme) and manually applying your changes to the Drupal source every time it updates, you may be glad to learn that CVS can help make this easier.

This is usually referred to as 'tracking third-party sources' and requires knowledge of the CVS concepts branching, release tags, and the vendor tag. We'll work through an example here and explain these concepts as we go.