Subversion - should anyone be developing off the trunk?

Question

When using Subversion, should developers be working off the trunk or should the trunk be only used for merges from each individual developer\'s branch and watched by a conti

Answer 1

I'm working on a version 3.0 of our product today and checking in my code changes into the trunk. The release is still several weeks ahead.

A coworker is experimenting with some features that might make it into 4.0, but definitely not into 3.0. She is checking her stuff into a separate branch. It would be wrong to check in that kind of stuff into the trunk.

Another coworker is fixing bugs in version 2.5, which we already shipped to a customer. He is checking them into the 2.5 branch for obvious reasons.

So, to answer the headline question (Should everyone be developing off the trunk, my answer is no. HTH

P.S. about merging. We could selectively merge some stuff from 2.5 branch to the trunk later, but not from the trunk back to the branch. The merging between the trunk and the 4.0 branch can go both ways.