title: How do I checkout an SVN repository, overwiting a non-versioned local directory?
body: <p>Say my SVN repository looks like:</p>
  
  <pre><code>project/
      trunk/
          README
          foo/
              bar.sh
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>and I have a local, <em>unversioned</em> directory like so:</p>
  
  <pre><code>svn/
      project/
          trunk/
              README
              foo/
                  hum.sh
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>if my cwd is <code>svn</code> and I <code>svn checkout http://...project/</code> I get the following:</p>
  
  <p><code>svn: Failed to add directory 'project/trunk': an unversioned directory of the same name already exists</code>.</p>
  
  <p>Fair enough. So: <code>svn checkout --force http://...project/</code> <em>does</em> check out the repository, but leaves existing files as they are (and reports an <code>E</code> for existing).</p>
  
  <p>Is it possible to checkout a repository, treating the repository as the 'preferred' version for any conflicting files? I.e. in the example above, I should end up with:</p>
  
  <pre><code>svn/
      project/
          trunk/
              README
              foo/
                  bar.sh
                  hum.sh
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>where <code>trunk/README</code> and <code>trunk/foo/bar.sh</code> are the versions from the repository, but <code>trunk/foo/hum.sh</code> is the local version. I'd expect a subsequent <code>svn status</code> to <em>only</em> report:</p>
  
  <pre><code>?    trunk/foo/hum.sh
  </code></pre>
  
  <p><strong>UPDATE</strong></p>
  
  <p>Hint: I'm probably approaching this from the wrong 'direction' I'm betting sensible use of <code>cp</code> having checked out the repository 'to the side' would do what I'm after, but I can't quite get my head around it ...</p>