[p4] tracking 3rd party sources

[Andy Finkenstadt]

Steve M. Robbins wrote:
> In addition, I got the impression that there ought not to be any
> codelines branched off from IMPORT, but it just has integrations
> directly into the development line.  So wouldn't having an IMPORT
> directory in MAIN (and also in REL1, REL2, ...) become confusing?  Do
> people successfully use it in this manner?
>   

What is working for us to accept varied third-party source and object 
code drops is to use a configuration like:

  //depot/vendor/$VENDOR_NAME/$PRODUCT_NAME/$PRODUCT_VERSION/...

where we follow the vendor drop pattern when receiving new code, as 
described in http://www.perforce.com/perforce/technotes/note015.html .

Then when we want to use a specific package within our main products, we 
integrate from the desired version (latest, usually) into our code location:

  p4 integ -t //depot/vendor/boost.org/boost/1.33/boost/... 
//depot/HeroEngine/MAIN/src/boost/...
  p4 resolve (options)
  p4 submit (options)

If we ever need to "rev up" a product's use of some later code, we just 
re-integrate:

  p4 integ -t //depot/vendor/boost.org/boost/1.34/boost/... 
//depot/HeroEngine/MAIN/src/boost/...
  p4 resolve (options)
  rem -- do a sanity test build and fix whatever errors happened, so 
that if we later revert this change, there's only the one change list to 
worry about.
  p4 submit (options)


--a