svnserve(8) System Manager's Manual svnserve(8)
NAME
svnserve - Server for the 'svn' repository access method
SYNOPSIS
svnserve [options]
DESCRIPTION
svnserve allows access to Subversion repositories using the svn network protocol. It can both run as a standalone server process, or it
can run out of inetd. You must choose a mode of operation when you start svnserve. The following options are recognized:
-d, --daemon
Causes svnserve to run in daemon mode. svnserve backgrounds itself and accepts and serves TCP/IP connections on the svn port (3690,
by default).
--listen-port=port
Causes svnserve to listen on port when run in daemon mode.
--listen-host=host
Causes svnserve to listen on the interface specified by host, which may be either a hostname or an IP address.
--foreground
When used together with -d, this option causes svnserve to stay in the foreground. This option is mainly useful for debugging.
-i, --inetd
Causes svnserve to use the stdin/stdout file descriptors, as is appropriate for a daemon running out of inetd.
-h, --help
Displays a usage summary and exits.
--version
Print svnserve's version and the repository filesystem back-end(s) a particular svnserve supports.
-r root, --root=root
Sets the virtual root for repositories served by svnserve. The pathname in URLs provided by the client will be interpreted relative
to this root, and will not be allowed to escape this root.
-R --read-only
Force all write operations through this svnserve instance to be forbidden, overriding all other access policy configuration. Do not
use this option to set general repository access policy - that is what the conf/svnserve.conf repository configuration file is for.
This option should be used only to restrict access via a certain method of invoking svnserve - for example, to allow write access via
SSH, but not via a svnserve daemon, or to create a restricted SSH key which is only capable of read access.
-t, --tunnel
Causes svnserve to run in tunnel mode, which is just like the inetd mode of operation (serve one connection over stdin/stdout) except
that the connection is considered to be pre-authenticated with the username of the current uid. This flag is selected by the client
when running over a tunnel agent.
--tunnel-user=username
When combined with --tunnel, overrides the pre-authenticated username with the supplied username. This is useful in combination with
the ssh authorized_key file's "command" directive to allow a single system account to be used by multiple committers, each having a
distinct ssh identity.
-T, --threads
When running in daemon mode, causes svnserve to spawn a thread instead of a process for each connection. The svnserve process still
backgrounds itself at startup time.
--config-file=filename
When specified, svnserve reads filename once at program startup and caches the svnserve configuration and any passwords and authoriza-
tion configuration referenced from filename. svnserve will not read any per-repository conf/svnserve.conf files when this option is
used. See the svnserve.conf(5) man page for details of the file format for this option.
--pid-file=filename
When specified, svnserve will write its process ID to filename.
-X, --listen-once
Causes svnserve to accept one connection on the svn port, serve it, and exit. This option is mainly useful for debugging.
Unless the --config-file option was specified on the command line, once the client has selected a repository by transmitting its URL,
svnserve reads a file named conf/svnserve.conf in the repository directory to determine repository-specific settings such as what authenti-
cation database to use and what authorization policies to apply. See the svnserve.conf(5) man page for details of that file format.
SEE ALSO
svnserve.conf(5)
svnserve(8)