A sane way to rename a directory in subversion working copy
Solution 1:
svn mv works for me:
C:\svn\co>svn mv my_dir new_dir
A new_dir
D my_dir\New Text Document.txt
D my_dir
C:\svn\co>svn commit -m foo
Raderar my_dir
Lägger till new_dir
Arkiverade revision 2.
C:\svn\co>
Sorry for the Swedish output of svn.
There must be something else that is wrong in your case.
Edit:
As pointed out in the comments by Lloeki
To reproduce the behavior you also need to update and commit a file contained in the folder, but not update the folder itself.
file commit creates a new rev n on the repo, but local metadata is not updated (as it has always be, see svn log after any commit) , thus dir metadata is at rev n-1. It follows that svn won't commit because of the metadata diff, and it won't update because there's indeed a conflict on the dir: update metadata vs delete.
The behavior is "expected" and the "solution" is to update the working copy before issuing the svn rename command.
Solution 2:
OK, I bumped into this - and can finally reconstruct the problem with a simple terminal session: the problem happens if you svn mv (move/rename) a file; then commit that change; then (without doing an svn update first), svn mv the parent directory of the file whose move/rename was previously committed - and finally do an svn commit on the change of the directory name - or as accepted answer puts it: "you also need to update and commit a file contained in the folder, but not update the folder itself"; but all of this executed in a parent (or rather, ancestor) directory. Here's command line log demonstrating the problem:
$ cd /tmp
$ svnadmin create myrepo
$ svn co file:///tmp/myrepo myrepo-wc
Checked out revision 0.
$ cd myrepo-wc/
$ mkdir -p dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn add dir1/
A dir1
A dir1/dir2
A dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn ci -m 'add dir1/'
Adding dir1
Adding dir1/dir2
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3
Committed revision 1.
$ echo test1 >> dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ echo test2 >> dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn add dir1/
svn: warning: 'dir1' is already under version control
$ svn add dir1/*
svn: warning: 'dir1/dir2' is already under version control
$ svn add dir1/dir2/dir3/*
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn status
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ svn ci -m 'add dir1/dir2/dir3/*'
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
Transmitting file data ..
Committed revision 2.
$ svn mv dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn status
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
A + dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
$ svn ci -m 'mv dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt'
Deleting dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
Committed revision 3.
$ svn status
$ svn mv dir1/dir2/dir3 dir1/dir2/dir3X
A dir1/dir2/dir3X
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn status
D dir1/dir2/dir3
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
A + dir1/dir2/dir3X
D + dir1/dir2/dir3X/test2.txt
$ svn ci -m 'mv dir1/dir2/dir3 dir1/dir2/dir3X'
Deleting dir1/dir2/dir3
svn: Commit failed (details follow):
svn: Directory '/dir1/dir2/dir3' is out of date
$ svn status
D dir1/dir2/dir3
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
A + dir1/dir2/dir3X
D + dir1/dir2/dir3X/test2.txt
$ svn up
C dir1/dir2/dir3
At revision 3.
Summary of conflicts:
Tree conflicts: 1
And this is how it should have been - doing an svn up after the file move/rename was comitted; note how the version numbers reported by svn status -v change after the svn update command:
$ cd /tmp
$ rm -rf myrepo*
$ svnadmin create myrepo
$ svn co file:///tmp/myrepo myrepo-wc
Checked out revision 0.
$ cd myrepo-wc/
$ mkdir -p dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn add dir1/
A dir1
A dir1/dir2
A dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn ci -m 'add dir1/'
Adding dir1
Adding dir1/dir2
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3
Committed revision 1.
$ echo test1 >> dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ echo test2 >> dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn add dir1/dir2/dir3/*
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn status
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ svn ci -m 'add dir1/dir2/dir3/*'
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
Transmitting file data ..
Committed revision 2.
$ svn mv dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
A dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
$ svn status
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
A + dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
$ svn ci -m 'mv dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt'
Deleting dir1/dir2/dir3/test2.txt
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
Committed revision 3.
$ svn status
$ svn status -v
0 0 ? .
1 1 username dir1
1 1 username dir1/dir2
1 1 username dir1/dir2/dir3
3 3 username dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
2 2 username dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ svn up
At revision 3.
$ svn status -v
3 3 username .
3 3 username dir1
3 3 username dir1/dir2
3 3 username dir1/dir2/dir3
3 3 username dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
3 2 username dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
$ svn mv dir1/dir2/dir3 dir1/dir2/dir3X
A dir1/dir2/dir3X
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3
$ svn status
D dir1/dir2/dir3
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test2X.txt
D dir1/dir2/dir3/test1.txt
A + dir1/dir2/dir3X
$ svn ci -m 'mv dir1/dir2/dir3 dir1/dir2/dir3X'
Deleting dir1/dir2/dir3
Adding dir1/dir2/dir3X
Committed revision 4.
$ svn status
$ svn status -v
3 3 username .
3 3 username dir1
3 3 username dir1/dir2
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X/test2X.txt
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X/test1.txt
$ svn up
At revision 4.
$ svn status -v
4 4 username .
4 4 username dir1
4 4 username dir1/dir2
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X/test2X.txt
4 4 username dir1/dir2/dir3X/test1.txt
And as OP said - should one forget to do the svn update before a new move/rename+commit, and the "Commit failed" occured - then one can use svn resolve --accept working -R . to be able to finish the commit action.
Solution 3:
This worked for me:
vi someotherfile
...various changes to the other file
svn mv olddir newdir
svn commit -m"Moved olddir out of the way" olddir
svn commit -m"New location of olddir" newdir
svn update
svn commit -m"Changed someotherfile" someotherfile
I suspect that there were various other possible ways round, and that ensuring there was a clean working directory before doing the svn mv would also have done the trick.