Outside of development work using repositories, I also handle a good amount of design documents, think Indesign/Photoshop etc. My workflow is like this:
- Substantial changes result in a new version number at the end of the file:
Document v34
- Branching to try out ideas uses a marker what this idea was:
Document v34-2 test-color-scheme
If the idea is approved, it results in a new version:
Document v35
- Tagging for long running designs adds the context where it was last used, this can be considered a final release version
Document v36 - July 2020 promo
Once a file is used like that, an export copy with the same name is saved in the same folder:
Document v36 - July 2020 promo.pdf
This document is copied using a general name and then moved to a different folder:
promo2020/july/flyer/Document.pdf
This is what is printed, e-mailed etc. Date and file size allow comparisons to find out which version this was.
While this falls apart for testing a lot of similar ideas at the same time, it has served me well to have a history of snapshots and their context, have all final documents archived, and ignore (or delete) all the versions in between, while still saving progress over days/weeks.
- Substantial changes result in a new version number at the end of the file:
Document v34
- Branching to try out ideas uses a marker what this idea was:
Document v34-2 test-color-scheme
If the idea is approved, it results in a new version:
Document v35
- Tagging for long running designs adds the context where it was last used, this can be considered a final release version
Document v36 - July 2020 promo
Once a file is used like that, an export copy with the same name is saved in the same folder:
Document v36 - July 2020 promo.pdf
This document is copied using a general name and then moved to a different folder:
promo2020/july/flyer/Document.pdf
This is what is printed, e-mailed etc. Date and file size allow comparisons to find out which version this was.
While this falls apart for testing a lot of similar ideas at the same time, it has served me well to have a history of snapshots and their context, have all final documents archived, and ignore (or delete) all the versions in between, while still saving progress over days/weeks.