Hello Thomas,
One and a half minutes to open a model is very long time and even with a very slow network, it indicates that something is not quite right with the Subversion setup.
I will send you a diagnostic tool to monitor the communication between EA and Subversion, to try to find where the problem is.
In answer to some of the points raised in this thread, here is some relevant technical information;
When you apply version control to packages in your EA model, EA subsequently enforces serialized editing of those packages. The reason for this is that the XMI file format used for version controlling the packages cannot be merged.
As Geert has already mentioned, EA queries the VC system to determine the status of all VC packages when a model is loaded. Packages that are checked-out to you are unlocked and may be edited. Packages that are not checked-out, or packages that are checked-out to somebody else, are locked and may not be edited by you.
Thomas, you state that "all files are already on disk checked-out under version control". That's fine for you, but if another user in your organisation loaded a copy of that model, all of those packages are locked to him. He would not be able to modify any of those packages until you checked them in and he subsequently checked them out.
That is why EA must connect to VC and query the status of all packages, each time the model is loaded.
Now, if you are traveling abroad and you don't have connection to your VC system, EA will use VC in its "offline" mode. Any packages that were previously checked-out to you are still marked as checked-out and others are still marked as checked-in (or locked). EA allows you to perform an "offline" check-out (so you can unlock and modify those packages), but you can not check-in again until you are back online.
For those occasions when you are "unplugged", EA also allows you to choose the "VC offline" mode before opening a model, to prevent any attempts to connect to VC and the error messages that would result from such attempts.
Finally, the post by Geert and the steps he describes relate to an SCC based version control system. Such systems usually provide "exclusive checkouts". Subversion and CVS operate differently to that and EA enforces the "exclusive locks" when using these two products.
When using Subversion, you need to lock a file to simulate a "check-out" and unlock a file to simulate a "check-in".
Please note however, that you are not importing or exporting the package files when you do this. You should ensure that any outstanding modifications are committed to version control before you start "playing" with the file status in this way, otherwise you may lose any recent changes.
regards,
Howard.