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(cvsbook.info)CVS says it is waiting for a lock; what does that mean?

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CVS says it is waiting for a lock; what does that mean?
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If you see a message like this

     cvs update: [22:58:26] waiting for qsmith's lock in /usr/local/newrepos/myproj

it means you're trying to access a subdirectory of the repository that
is locked by some other CVS process at the moment.  A process is being
run in that directory so it may not be in a consistent state for other
CVS processes to use.

However, if the wait message persists for a long time, it probably means
that a CVS process failed to clean up after itself, for whatever reason.
It can happen when CVS dies suddenly and unexpectedly, say, due to a
power failure on the repository machine.

The solution is to remove the lock files by hand from the repository
subdirectory in question.  Go into that part of the repository and look
for files named `#cvs.lock' or that begin with `#cvs.wfl' or
`#cvs.rfl'.  Compare the file's timestamps with the start times of any
currently running CVS processes.  If the files could not possibly have
been created by any of those processes, it's safe to delete them.  The
waiting CVS processes eventually notice when the lock files are gone -
this should take about 30 seconds - and allow the requested operation
to proceed.

See the node `Locks' in the Cederqvist manual for more details.