title: How do I do source code management without version control tools?
body: <p>I work on a software project which has a suite of source code that undergoes periodic change. The code is typically promoted to a production environment, and development continues in a development environment. Emergency hotfixes in production need to be backported to development. A third environment for testing may also exist from time to time. Many developers work on this code at the same time, often needing to make changes to the same individual file.</p>
  
  <p>In short, a classic use-case for version control software. Unfortunately, we have a stone age IT department, and we do all our development in a stock Windows XP environment with absolutely no possibility of using any other software without approval - which never happens. We are lucky to have Winzip.</p>
  
  <p><strong>So what's the best way of managing the above workflow without any real tools?</strong> At the moment we are just editing files on a Windows shared drive, making ad-hoc working copies into folders with names like "James's Copy of X", doing backups with Winzip, and calling across the room, "is anybody working on this file at the moment?"</p>
  
  <p>Thanks,
  James</p>
  
  <p>Edit: Some clarifications:</p>
  
  <p>The irony is that the system is hardly locked down at all - I could download, install and configure TortoiseHg in about 7 minutes. But I need to do this by the book.</p>
  
  <p>I am also actively pursuing getting version control software through official channels, but ETA for that is 6-9 months if ever, so I'm just trying to do the best I can with what I have <em>now</em>.</p>
  
  <p>Finally, trust me, you will be reading about this project on TheDailyWTF one day, so please help me out with what <em>I</em> can do <em>now</em> rather than what management should have done last week.</p>