# VCS Repository Management for Go
Manage repos in varying version control systems with ease through a common
interface.
[](https://github.com/Masterminds/vcs/actions/workflows/linux-tests.yaml) [](https://goreportcard.com/report/github.com/Masterminds/vcs)
[](https://github.com/Masterminds/vcs/actions/workflows/windows-tests.yaml) [](https://pkg.go.dev/github.com/Masterminds/vcs)
**Note: Module names are case sensitive. Please be sure to use `github.com/Masterminds/vcs` with the capital M.**
## Quick Usage
Quick usage:
remote := "https://github.com/Masterminds/vcs"
local, _ := ioutil.TempDir("", "go-vcs")
repo, err := NewRepo(remote, local)
In this case `NewRepo` will detect the VCS is Git and return a `GitRepo`. All of
the repos implement the `Repo` interface with a common set of features between
them.
## Supported VCS
Git, SVN, Bazaar (Bzr), and Mercurial (Hg) are currently supported. They each
have their own type (e.g., `GitRepo`) that follow a simple naming pattern. Each
type implements the `Repo` interface and has a constructor (e.g., `NewGitRepo`).
The constructors have the same signature as `NewRepo`.
## Features
- Clone or checkout a repository depending on the version control system.
- Pull updates to a repository.
- Get the currently checked out commit id.
- Checkout a commit id, branch, or tag (depending on the availability in the VCS).
- Get a list of tags and branches in the VCS.
- Check if a string value is a valid reference within the VCS.
- More...
For more details see [the documentation](https://godoc.org/github.com/Masterminds/vcs).
## Motivation
The package `golang.org/x/tools/go/vcs` provides some valuable functionality
for working with packages in repositories in varying source control management
systems. That package, while useful and well tested, is designed with a specific
purpose in mind. Our uses went beyond the scope of that package. To implement
our scope we built a package that went beyond the functionality and scope
of `golang.org/x/tools/go/vcs`.