Some of the code needs access to a single file in SVN, e.g. https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/incubator/public/trunk/content/podlings.xml
AFAIK there are no other items needed in the same part of SVN. Yet one has to checkout the parent directory and keep it updated. This is a nuisance for testing purposes. For SVN files that don't need authentication, it is easy enough to fetch the file using HTTP(S) and cache it locally. For subsequent requests, the cache date can be used in an If-Modified request. The last checked date can also be saved to avoid checking the file too often. This technique has been used in reporter.a.o for checking the chair index in foundation/index.mdtext: https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/comdev/reporter.apache.org/trunk/scripts/parsepmcs.py Might be worth cosidering re-implementing the python caching code used there.
