Getting the last version of a deleted folder in subversion

Question

I need to get the content of folder deleted from our repository long time ago

• I still know the name of the folder
• I don't know the revision in which it was deleted
• I don't know the date when it was deleted
• In the history of the parent directory there is no information (i.e., there is not comment mentioning that the folder is deleted)

svn log doesn't seem to help:

$ svn log deleted_folder
svn: 'deleted_folder' is not under version control

svn co also doesn't help

$ svn co URL/deleted_folder

How can I find out the last revision of the deleted folder?

EDIT: an option would be with brute force to check backwards for every revision but as there are more than 10K of them the option would be just for emergency. And I really feel that there definitely must be a better way.

Answer 1

You can find the revision that the directory was deleted in by going to the parent directory of the deleted directory and using the following command:

 svn log -v . > somefile

then search somefile in an editor for the revision record contain the delete for the directory name.

Answer 2

You may find the revision using:

svn log -v | grep "D /deleted_folder" -C 5

Then you should copy the revision to current according to answer of this question:

examining history of deleted file