The Monticello Browser is the central window of the interface. All versioning operations begin with the Monticello Browser.
The browser contains two panes. The left pane contains the list of packages that have Working Copies in the image. In parenthesis, the immediate ancestors of the Working Copies are also listed. Packages that have been modified since they were loaded are displayed with an asterisk before their names. The list on the right shows the repositories that are configured for the selected package. The buttons across the top are enabled and disabled depending on the selections in the two panes; many commands require you to first select a package and repository.
The '+Package' button is used to create a Working Copy for a package. When you click on it, Monticello will ask for the name of the Package you want to version, the same name that PackageInfo uses to identify the package. Once the Working Copy has been created, the name of the package will appear in the left pane. The '+Package' button should only be used to create a Working Copy for a brand-new package, one that has not previously versioned with Monticello. To create a Working Copy from an existing Version, you should load the version from a repository or directly from an .mcz file using the FileList. See Getting Started for details.
The 'Browse' button takes a Snapshot of the current state of the selected package and opens a Snapshot Browser on it.
The 'History' button opens a History Browser on the Working Copy for the selected pacakge.
The 'Changes' button is used to display the changes made to the selected package since it was last saved or loaded. Monticello first takes a Snapshot of the package and compares it to the package's first immediate ancestor. If any changes have been made, a Patch Browser is opened to display them.
The 'Save' button is for saving new Versions of the selected package. It opens a dialog that allows you to enter the name of the new version and a log message describing the changes made since the last version. If you click 'accept,' Monticello will take a Snapshot of the package and save it as a Version to the selected repository.
The '+Repository' button is used to connect to a Repository. It opens a menu allowing you to choose the type of repository you with to connect to, and depending on the repository type, a configuration dialog for the connection.
The 'Open' button opens a Repository Inspector on the selected repository. The is useful when you need to find a specific Version to load, merge, browse etc.