What is the ideal number of programmers for lock based SCM not to become a severe issue in development?
Edit:
Fundamentally, I am not asking if there are merits to locking or merging (that is an unresolvable flame war). I am asking for the number of programmers where locking becomes a serious problem. I myself have found 4 to a good number, but this assumes the following
- most everybody works in the same office within yelling distance
- work is mostly disjoint (which makes locking not an issue except for common files {side note: my experiences is that merging is the best when there are little to no common files to accomplish tasks, which could be a series of questions on how does one organize code to such that common files are not needed by more than one person).
- the build can’t be broken by premature lock release/commit.
The ideal number of programmers when using exclusive lock is 1. Above, it’s just painful, annoying, frustrating, etc. So, unless you’re a team of BAs working on things that can’t be merged (like word documents), don’t do it, be real men/programmers and merge!