This section is from the "Version Control with Subversion" book, by Ben Collins-Sussman, Brian W. Fitzpatrick and C. Michael Pilato. Also available from Amazon: Version Control with Subversion.
The Apache HTTP Server is a “heavy duty” network server that Subversion can leverage. Via a custom module, httpd makes Subversion repositories available to clients via the WebDAV/DeltaV protocol, which is an extension to HTTP 1.1 (see http://www.webdav.org/ for more information). This protocol takes the ubiquitous HTTP protocol that is the core of the World Wide Web, and adds writing—specifically, versioned writing—capabilities. The result is a standardized, robust system that is conveniently packaged as part of the Apache 2.0 software, is supported by numerous operating systems and third-party products, and doesn't require network administrators to open up yet another custom port. [43] While an Apache-Subversion server has more features than svnserve, it's also a bit more difficult to set up. With flexibility often comes more complexity.
Much of the following discussion includes references to Apache configuration directives. While some examples are given of the use of these directives, describing them in full is outside the scope of this chapter. The Apache team maintains excellent documentation, publicly available on their website at http://httpd.apache.org. For example, a general reference for the configuration directives is located at http://httpd.apache.org/docs-2.0/mod/directives.html.
Also, as you make changes to your Apache setup, it is likely
that somewhere along the way a mistake will be made. If you are
not already familiar with Apache's logging subsystem, you should
become aware of it. In your httpd.conf
file are directives that specify the on-disk locations of the
access and error logs generated by Apache (the
CustomLog
and ErrorLog
directives, respectively). Subversion's mod_dav_svn uses
Apache's error logging interface as well. You can always browse
the contents of those files for information that might reveal
the source of a problem that is not clearly noticeable
otherwise.