Using Perforce with the Adobe Source Libraries
The Adobe Source Libraries have migrated away from the SourceForge CVS/Subversion servers in favor of a Perforce server that is hosted on stlab.adobe.com. Guest access for this server is enabled, allowing anonymous users to grab snapshots of the current release sources as well as the current working set of sources for the upcoming release.
The primary difference between Perforce and other CMS services like CVS or Subversion is that the state of the client’s image of the depot (repository in CVS parlance) is stored server-side, not derived client-side. This requires the creation and maintenance of per-user clientspecs (client path mapping specifications), and branchspecs (file/directory branching specifications). The following steps will guide you through two mutually-exclusive scenarios. In either case you will have to download the Perforce client first.
Contents
Perforce Depot Location
The Adobe Source Libraries’ Perforce depot is at
stlab.adobe.com:10666
Downloading Perforce
The Perforce client software is free and can be downloaded for Windows, Mac OS X PPC, Mac OS X x86, Cygwin, and a host of other platforms.
Each operating system at a minimum has a command-line binary available.
For some operating systems there are GUI front end applications
available as well (Mac OS X, Windows). If you
are following these instructions you will want to download the
command-line client, and place the p4 application in a
directory that is in your computer’s PATH.
Scenario 1: Using p4checkout
p4checkout is intended to emulate the CVS
checkout command, grabbing a snapshot of the state of the
ASL depot and copying it to your local computer.
The pros of this method are that it is anonymous and very easy to execute.
The cons of this method are that there is no permanent record-keeping, and as such you will not be able to submit any changes to the Adobe Source Libraries.
This method is recommended for users of the Adobe Source Libraries who are interested in the state of the depot without having a desire to contribute directly to the project.
If you are on Windows machine, download the following batch file http://easynews.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/adobe-source/p4checkout.bat
If you are on Mac OS X, Linux, or some other *nix-compatible system, there is a bash shell script to download: http://easynews.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/adobe-source/p4checkout.sh
When you have this file downloaded (either version), you simply place it in the directory you would like to serve as the root directory for your local copy of the ASL depot, and you run it. (You did download a Perforce client already, didn’t you?)
The script will create a temporary (anonymous) client spec, sync the server’s contents to your computer, and delete the client spec from the server. Please note this is a destructive sync, so any local changes to files that are to be synced will be overwritten.
Note that this is not enough to get you building ASL yet: you will have to download and patch Boost, and then you will be ready.
For more information on the p4checkout utility, pass ‘help’ as the first parameter to the script.
Scenario 2: Using a user-specific clientspec
The second method for interacting with the stlab.adobe.com Perforce server is the more traditional method of doing source code management in Perforce. The pros to this method are that you will be able to check in and check out files directly to the stlab.adobe.com Perforce server. The cons are that there are several steps required in order to get up and running. However, once everything is in place, the general Perforce workflow is very easy. The general steps of this process are:
- Obtain an account on the stlab.adobe.com Perforce server.
- Create a clientspec for your local machine
- Synchronizing with the server
Obtaining a user account can be accomplished by emailing one of the administrators of the Adobe Source Libraries.
Once you have a user account (and, assuming you have already downloaded a Perforce client) you can create you client spec by executing the following from a command line:
p4 client {nameofclient}
… where {nameofclient} is the client spec name. Note that you can have as many client specs as you need, on as many machines as you need. When you execute this some text editing application will launch and you will see something like the following:
# A Perforce Client Specification.
Client: fbrereto
Owner: fbrereto
Description:
Created by fbrereto.
Root: /Users/fbrereto/opensource/
Options: noallwrite noclobber compress unlocked nomodtime normdir
LineEnd: local
View:
//release/... //fbrereto/release/...
//submission/... //fbrereto/submission/...
Feel free to change the Root path as you see fit. This will
be the top-level folder in which Perforce will store your local version
of the stlab.adobe.com depots. The Options flags need
not change, but changing “nocompress” to “compress” may speed up network
transmission of files. Finally, save the file and close the text editor
to commit the client spec to Perforce.
The final step in the process is syncing the remote server to your local computer. This is done in one step:
p4 sync
Note that this is not enough to get you building ASL yet: you will have to download and patch Boost, and then you will be ready.
Also note that in order to check in changes to ASL’s Perforce depot, you will need to do so in the sandbox depot. This will require you to create a branchspec and integrate the sources from the submission depot into your sandbox. For more information on working with Perforce, the clientspec, and branchspecs, please see the Perforce User Guide.