Which protocol? svn:// or http(s)://?

Question

There are four common protocols for network access of SVN.

svn://repos
svn+ssh://repos
https://repos
http://repos

The Wikipedia page doesn\

Answer 1

svn+ssh is the svn protocol run inside a SSH tunnel. The client uses SSH to log on the remote server and remotely runs the svn command in that tunnel. In my view, svn+ssh is the easiest way to use a subversion repository on a distant system, because you do not have any server to launch on that system, assuming that you already have a SSH server running.

Also, svn+ssh benefits from the cryptographic protection of SSH. Do not use raw svn protocol over untrusted networks.

The main problem with svn+ssh is that it requires shell access on the remote machine. It is difficult to offer someone access to the repository without giving him access to the whole shell account. For that, you want one of the HTTP-based methods, i.e. http or https (preferably https because of the encryption-and-authentication layer). These methods are more complex to configure (you need a HTTP/HTTPS server, e.g. Apache) but allow the repository administrator to carefully and precisely control repository access rights.