EasyMercurial: a version control interface from SoundSoftware.ac.uk

Version control

We're delighted to be able to announce the release of EasyMercurial, a simple program for managing version control for files and projects.

EasyMercurial is an interface for the popular Mercurial version control system — the system used in our own SoundSoftware Repository.

When we set up our repository service, we needed to be sure that we were providing version control that made sense to our users and peers — research students in demanding and often technical subjects, but with no desire to become too involved in the minutiae of software code management.

Having examined a number of options, we decided to provide a Mercurial service and to make sure we had a straightforward, cross-platform client application for it which we could use for introductory and explanatory purposes.

EasyMercurial, which we developed based on an existing program by Jari Korhonen, is that application. We've developed it with particular reference to the things people around us were finding confusing about collaborative working with modern version control systems, such as managing the merge workflow. We've found it quite successful so far.

If you'd like to let us know what you think, just drop us a line or contact the lead developer (Chris) directly.

Now that we have the 1.0 release out, we'll be writing some more updates shortly with descriptions and videos of simple uses of EasyMercurial with the SoundSoftware repository.

Of course, there are many other client applications for Mercurial and many other excellent version control systems. We strongly encourage every researcher to make use of version control, no matter how you do it or which system you choose, and we will be putting up some notes about other version control systems here as well. Watch this space!

(See also: our earlier post, Why use version control?)

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Recent notes

MLSP Prizes for Reproducibility: Winners announced!

Announcing the winners of the MLSP 2014 and SoundSoftware.ac.uk Prizes for Reproducibility in Signal Processing, organised by SoundSoftware.ac.uk in conjuction with the IEEE Signal Processing Society for the 2014 IEEE International Workshop on Machine Learning for Signal Processing.

SoundSoftware 2014: Videos now available!

The SoundSoftware 2014 workshop, our third annual workshop on software and data in audio and music research, was just as enjoyable as the previous two. Because so much research in this field ends up being expressed through software, a software workshop turns out to be all about the means by which research becomes useful and relevant to people other than the original researchers—fertile ground for interesting and thought-provoking talks.

The workshop videos are now available online at http://soundsoftware.ac.uk/soundsoftware2014, so if you weren't able to make it in person, catch up here!

Our third annual one-day workshop on Software and Data for Audio and Music Research takes place on the 8th of July 2014 at Queen Mary, University of London. The workshop includes talks on issues such as robust software development for audio and music research, reproducible research in general, management of research data, and open access. Read more here, clear your calendar, and register now!