How to convince people to use revision control

[Garth Hill]

Dave Smith wrote:
>  Can you give me any suggestions on how I can convince him to join the 
> rest of the civilized world and use revision control daily, without 
> being a jerk and going over his head?
Among other benefits, revision control helps me to keep the house tidy 
as it were:

1. Use cvs update to figure out what files I've edited (I'm sure there 
are other ways).
2. Use cvs diff to see /what/ I changed exactly, and give me a chance to 
remove debug and other extraneous code.
3. cvs commit to know that the version in the system is a good revision 
(with an appropriate comment on what I changed).

Just like a house, codebases can get dirty and ugly and take a long time 
to clean.  Revisioning helps to do minor tidying on a regular basis.  It 
also gives a history of the incremental changes you've made instead of a 
few big commits that can't be explained easily.  But, the hardest thing 
to change is inertia.  I'm guessing most ppl finally see the light when 
they learn the behavior.  It's just a matter of starting.  Of course it 
becomes even more indispensable on collaborative projects.

-- 

Garth

    Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the
    overcoming of it.
    ~Helen Keller