The advantage of SVN is that it has been around longer, so you can (e.g.) find GUI software that leads you through it, like TortoiseSVN, or those two SVN clients for the Mac that conveniently came out just as I switched to git. :]
That's the only advantage, though. I frankly don't understand the notion that SVN is easier to learn than git. Git has its tricky points (like the index), and its documentation and teaching material have only recently emerged from obscurity, but I think it's conceptually more straightforward, particularly because you can use it without having to set up a server. And you can back up your entire repository by just dragging your working directory to some backup media, so crazy experiments feel a lot less risky.
Start at github. And I learned mainly from the git screencast at Peepcode and the Randal Schwartz Google talk on git.
"Don't know anything" isn't accurate. It's not as if I don't follow the issues in question, read people's opinions, articles, commentary, and so on. It's just that I haven't used git myself, yet, aside from checkouts.
My point is merely that, if I were given the choice today to learn a version control system for my own use (like the poster), I would pick git because that seems to be where things are going. svn works well enough for me and I don't see any need to chase after the buzz, but sooner or later I too will probably get around to figuring out the ins and outs of git.
Either one is obviously a vast improvement over no version control.
Comments
I've never really used git, but it seems to be the future, so you might as well start with that, no?
The advantage of SVN is that it has been around longer, so you can (e.g.) find GUI software that leads you through it, like TortoiseSVN, or those two SVN clients for the Mac that conveniently came out just as I switched to git. :]
That's the only advantage, though. I frankly don't understand the notion that SVN is easier to learn than git. Git has its tricky points (like the index), and its documentation and teaching material have only recently emerged from obscurity, but I think it's conceptually more straightforward, particularly because you can use it without having to set up a server. And you can back up your entire repository by just dragging your working directory to some backup media, so crazy experiments feel a lot less risky.
Start at github. And I learned mainly from the git screencast at Peepcode and the Randal Schwartz Google talk on git.
I found mercurial much easier to learn/explain than git (the hg team seems to be more interested in keeping its public interface clean), and it has TortoiseHG (http://tortoisehg.sourceforge.net/) on Windows. (There are several other graphic interfaces available: http://www.selenic.com/mercurial/wiki/index.cgi/OtherTools)
This book helps, too: http://hgbook.red-bean.com/
No offense, but if you really don't know, it probably doesn't help to just unquestioningly repeat buzz you've heard.
"Don't know anything" isn't accurate. It's not as if I don't follow the issues in question, read people's opinions, articles, commentary, and so on. It's just that I haven't used git myself, yet, aside from checkouts.
My point is merely that, if I were given the choice today to learn a version control system for my own use (like the poster), I would pick git because that seems to be where things are going. svn works well enough for me and I don't see any need to chase after the buzz, but sooner or later I too will probably get around to figuring out the ins and outs of git.
Either one is obviously a vast improvement over no version control.
Ah. I'd say checkouts counts as using it, FWIW.
(Mercurial is really good, too.)