[p4] "Large ISO files" and the "+S" modifier

[David Faison]

JUST IN CASE....

No, I didn't notice anyone in the "Large ISO files" thread mention the
"+S" filetype modifier, but it made me recall my recent personal
experience, and just in case someone is tempted to use this feature, I
thought I would post a warning...

	[{filetype}+S]  server stores only single head revision

If you are storing large files (like CD images, build artifacts, etc)
for convenience and/or distribution purposes only, you might be tempted
use the "+S" modifier on your archives.

Before doing so, please note that Perforce is, to my knowledge, still
trying to resolve a bug that occurs when you attempt to integrate
archives denoted with the "+S" type modifier. As of 2005.2 (which I
upgraded to in an attempt to resolve this problem), Perforce still does
not behave as expected when you use the "p4 resolve -as" mechanism to
process branch integrations. 

Using the "p4 resolve -as" on archives that have the "+S" modifier will
cause changes in the source location to be ignored, and an integration
record will be generated for the target, denoting that you 'wanted' the
integration to be ignored. 

Perforce Support explained that the bug results from the P4 command not
knowing how to handle the fact that the base revision of the integration
is gone.

This issue caused us much hair pulling until we finally resolved the
underlying cause of the problem....

__________________________

David Faison, Software Configuration Manager
Photon Research Associates, Inc.