Version control systems

Sane programmers don´t write production code without the help of an editor and an interpreter or a compiler, yet the author has seen many software projects limping along without using a version control system. We can explain this contrast if we think in terms of the increased start-up costs and delayed gratification associated with adopting a VCS. We humans typically discount the future, and therefore implementing version control in a project appears to be a fight against human nature. It´s true that you can´t beat the productivity boost that compilers and editors provide, but four decades after punched-card programming in assembly language has gone out of fashion, we must now look elsewhere for our next efficiency gains. And if you or your project isn´t using a VCS, adopting one might well be the single most important tooling improvement you can undertake.