software development Software development is the process of designing and Implementation, implementing a software solution to Computer user satisfaction, satisfy a User (computing), user. The process is more encompassing than Computer programming, programming, wri ...

, a codebase (or code base) is a collection of

source code In computing, source code, or simply code or source, is a plain text computer program written in a programming language. A programmer writes the human readable source code to control the behavior of a computer. Since a computer, at base, only ...

used to build a particular

software system A software system is a system of intercommunicating software component, components based on software forming part of a computer system (a combination of Computer hardware, hardware and software). It "consists of a number of separate Computer progr ...

, application, or

software component A software component is a modular unit of software that encapsulates specific functionality. The desired characteristics of a component are reusability and maintainability. Value Components allow software development to assemble software ...

. Typically, a codebase includes only human-written

system files; thus, a codebase usually does not include source code files generated by tools (generated files) or binary library files (object files), as they can be built from the human-written source code. However, it generally does include configuration and property files, as they are the data necessary for the build. A codebase is typically stored in a source control repository in a

version control Version control (also known as revision control, source control, and source code management) is the software engineering practice of controlling, organizing, and tracking different versions in history of computer files; primarily source code t ...

system. A source code repository is a place where large amounts of source code are kept, either publicly or privately. Source code repositories are used most basically for backups and versioning, and on multi-developer projects to handle various source code versions and to provide aid in resolving conflicts that arise from developers submitting overlapping modifications.

Subversion Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to sabotage the established social order and its structures of Power (philosophy), power, authority, tradition, h ...

Git Git () is a distributed version control system that tracks versions of files. It is often used to control source code by programmers who are developing software collaboratively. Design goals of Git include speed, data integrity, and suppor ...

and Mercurial are examples of popular tools used to handle this workflow, which are common in open source projects. For smaller projects, its code may be kept as a non-managed set of files (even the

Linux kernel The Linux kernel is a Free and open-source software, free and open source Unix-like kernel (operating system), kernel that is used in many computer systems worldwide. The kernel was created by Linus Torvalds in 1991 and was soon adopted as the k ...

was maintained as a set of files for many years).

Distinct and monolithic codebases

Multiple projects can have separate, ''distinct codebases,'' or can have a single, ''shared'' or ''.'' This is particularly the case for related projects, such as those developed within the same company. In more detail, a monolithic codebase typically entails a single repository (all the code in one place), and often a common build system or common libraries. Whether the codebase is shared or split does not depend on the system architecture and actual build results; thus, a monolithic codebase, which is related to the actual development, does not entail a monolithic system, which is related to software architecture or a single monolithic binary. As a result, a monolithic codebase may and (for large codebases) often will consist of separate components, instead of carrying only a single system or single binary; a distributed codebase (with multiple components) can be used to build a single monolithic system or even a single binary. For example, the Linux kernel is architecturally a single

monolithic kernel A monolithic kernel is an operating system software architecture, architecture with the entire operating system running in kernel space. The monolithic model differs from other architectures such as the microkernel in that it alone defines a high ...

, but it consists of separate binaries (loadable components), and is developed in multiple distributed repositories. There are both advantages and disadvantages to a monolithic codebase when it is compared to a distributed codebase. Most simply, a monolithic codebase simplifies integrationchanges to different components or refactoring of code between components can be done easily and atomicallyand allows operations across the entire codebase, but requires a larger repository and makes it easier to introduce wide-ranging technical debt. A separate codebase or a distributed codebase keeps individual repositories smaller and more manageable, enforcing at the same time separation between components, but it also requires integration between codebases (or with the main repository), and complicates changes that span multiple codebases. In terms of standards, referring to multiple codebases as "distinct" declares that there are independent implementations without shared source code and that, historically, these implementations did not evolve from a common project. This may be a way of demonstrating interoperability by showing two independent pieces of software that implement a given standard.

Examples

Some notably large codebases include: *

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

: monolithic, 1 billion files, 9 million source code files, 2 billion lines of source code, 35 million commits in total, 86 TB total size (January 2015) *

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

: monolithic, 8 GB (repo 54 GB including history, 2014), hundreds of thousands of files (2014) *

: distributed, over 15 million lines of code ( and kernel version 3.10)

References

{{Reflist, 30em Source code Version control

Distinct and monolithic codebases

Examples

See also

References