The exact process differs for each client, so this document is intended to give you the general steps involved in creating a new project. We are working on developing documentation for some popular clients, but until then, please refer to the documentation for the specific client you are using.

1. Create a directory for the project – Each project should have it's own “root” directory in Subversion. For some projects, this might be the top-level project directory, but for many, you will need to create another subdirectory for the project. Most GUI clients provide some type of Repository Browser that will let you create directories on the subversion server remotely. Think of an short, recognizable name for the projects parent directory.
2. Create the trunk, tags, and branches subdirectories – By convention, Subversion projects are organized into three main subdirectories: trunk, tags, and branches.
   • Trunk – the trunk is the main development area. You will generally be working out of this directory.
   • Tags – Tags are really useful for keeping track of important events in the life cycle of your project. They act like a “snapshot” of the project and can be used to keep track of releases, qa cycles, etc.
   • Branches – A branch represents a fork in the history of the repository; the same file may have two or more sets of independent changes made to it, each set existing in a separate branch. There are generally two reasons to create a branch: generating releases and giving developers a place to experiment.
3. Import your existing code (or just some stub files for a new project) into the trunk directory. Importing is a way to upload an existing project quickly into the Subversion repository.
4. Checkout the trunk to create your new “working copy”. Choose a new location on your workstation to create your own local copy of the project and checkout the trunk directory from the repository.

That's it! You're done with the initial project creation, now it's time to make some changes and get follow the basic work cycle: update, make changes, merge other's changes, commit your changes. See the daily workflow documentation for some quick tips and more resources.