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1 | =head1 NAME |
2 | |
3 | repository - Using the Perl repository |
4 | |
5 | This document describes what a Perl Porter needs to do |
6 | to start using the Perl repository. |
7 | |
8 | =head1 Prerequisites |
9 | |
10 | You'll need to get hold of the following software. |
11 | |
12 | =over 4 |
13 | |
14 | =item Perforce |
15 | |
16 | Download a perforce client from: |
17 | |
18 | http://www.perforce.com/perforce/loadprog.html |
19 | |
20 | You'll probably also want to look at: |
21 | |
22 | http://www.perforce.com/perforce/technical.html |
23 | |
24 | where you can look at or download its documentation. |
25 | |
26 | =item ssh |
27 | |
28 | If you don't already have access to an ssh client, then look at its |
29 | home site C<http://www.cs.hut.fi/ssh> which mentions ftp sites from |
30 | which it's available. You only need to build the client parts (ssh |
31 | and ssh-keygen should suffice). |
32 | |
33 | =back |
34 | |
35 | =head1 Creating an SSH Key Pair |
36 | |
37 | If you already use ssh and want to use the same key pair for perl |
38 | repository access then you can skip the rest of this section. |
39 | Otherwise, generate an ssh key pair for use with the repository |
40 | by typing the command |
41 | |
42 | ssh-keygen |
43 | |
44 | After generating a key pair and testing it, ssh-keygen will ask you |
45 | to enter a filename in which to save the key. The default it offers |
46 | will be the file F<~/.ssh/identity> which is suitable unless you |
47 | particularly want to keep separate ssh identities for some reason. |
48 | If so, you could save the perl repository private key in the file |
49 | F<~/.ssh/perl>, for example, but I will use the standard filename |
50 | in the remainder of the examples of this document. |
51 | |
52 | After typing in the filename, it will prompt you to type in a |
53 | passphrase. The private key will itself be encrypted so that it is |
54 | usable only when that passphrase is typed. (When using ssh, you will |
55 | be prompted when it requires a pass phrase to unlock a private key.) |
56 | If you provide a blank passphrase then no passphrase will be needed |
57 | to unlock the key and, as a consequence, anyone who gains access to |
58 | the key file gains access to accounts protected with that key |
59 | (barring additional configuration to restrict access by IP address). |
60 | |
61 | When you have typed the passphrase in twice, ssh-keygen will confirm |
62 | where it has saved the private key (in the filename you gave and |
63 | with permissions set to be only readable by you), what your public |
64 | key is (don't worry: you don't need to memorise it) and where it |
65 | has saved the corresponding public key. The public key is saved in |
66 | a filename corresponding to your private key's filename but with |
67 | ".pub" appended, usually F<~/.ssh/identity.pub>. That public key |
68 | can be (but need not be) world readable. It is not used by your |
69 | own system at all. |
70 | |
71 | =head1 Notifying the Repository Keeper |
72 | |
73 | Mail the contents of that public key file to the keeper of the perl |
74 | repository (see L</Contact Information> below). |
75 | When the key is added to the repository host's configuration file, |
76 | you will be able to connect to it with ssh by using the corresponding |
77 | private key file (after unlocking it with your chosen passphrase). |
78 | |
79 | =head1 Connecting to the Repository |
80 | |
81 | Connections to the repository are made by using ssh to provide a |
82 | TCP "tunnel" rather than by using ssh to login to or invoke any |
83 | ordinary commands on the repository. When you want to start a |
84 | session using the repository, use the command |
85 | |
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86 | ssh -l perlrep -f -q -x -L 1666:127.0.0.1:1666 sickle.activestate.com foo |
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87 | |
88 | If you are not using the default filename of F<~/.ssh/identity> |
89 | to hold your perl repository private key then you'll need to add |
90 | the option B<-i filename> to tell ssh where it is. Unless you chose |
91 | a blank passphrase for that private key, ssh will prompt you for the |
92 | passphrase to unlock that key. Then ssh will fork and put itself |
93 | in the background, returning you (silently) to your shell prompt. |
94 | The tunnel for repository access is now ready for use. |
95 | |
96 | For the sake of completeness (and for the case where the chosen |
97 | port of 1666 is already in use on your machine), I'll briefly |
98 | describe what all those ssh arguments are for. |
99 | |
100 | =over 4 |
101 | |
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102 | =item B<-l perlrep> |
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103 | |
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104 | Use a remote username of perlrep. (The account on the repository which |
105 | provides the end-point of the ssh tunnel is named "perlrep".) |
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106 | |
107 | =item B<-f> |
108 | |
109 | Tells ssh to fork and remain running in the background. Since ssh |
110 | is only being used for its tunnelling capabilities, the command |
111 | that ssh runs never does any I/O and can sit silently in the |
112 | background. |
113 | |
114 | =item B<-q> |
115 | |
116 | Tells ssh to be quiet. Without this option, ssh will output a |
117 | message each time you use a p4 command (since each p4 command |
118 | tunnels over the ssh connection to reach the repository). |
119 | |
120 | =item B<-x> |
121 | |
122 | Tells ssh not to bother to set up a tunnel for X11 connections. |
123 | The repository doesn't allow this anyway. |
124 | |
125 | =item B<-L 1666:127.0.0.1:1666> |
126 | |
127 | This is the important option. It tells ssh to listen out for |
128 | connections made to port 1666 on your local machine. When such |
129 | a connection is made, the ssh client tells the remote side |
130 | (the corresponding ssh daemon on the repository) to make a |
131 | connection to IP address 127.0.0.1, port 1666. Data flowing |
132 | along that connection is tunnelled over the ssh connection |
133 | (encrypted). The perforce daemon running on the repository |
134 | only accepts connections from localhost and that is exactly |
135 | where ssh-tunnelled connections appear to come from. |
136 | |
137 | If port 1666 is already in use on your machine then you can |
138 | choose any non-privileged port (a number between 1024 and 65535) |
139 | which happens to be free on your machine. It's the first of the |
140 | three colon separated values that you should change. Picking |
141 | port 2345 would mean changing the option to |
142 | B<-L 2345:127.0.0.1:1666>. Whatever port number you choose should |
143 | be used for the value of the P4PORT environment variable (q.v.). |
144 | |
145 | =item sickle.activestate.com |
146 | |
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147 | This is the canonical name of the host on which the perl repository |
148 | resides. Its IP address is 199.60.48.20. |
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149 | |
150 | =item foo |
151 | |
152 | This is a dummy place holder argument. Without an argument |
153 | here, ssh will try to perform an interactive login to the |
154 | repository which is not allowed. Ordinarily, this argument |
155 | is for the one-off command which is to be executed on the |
156 | remote host. However, the repository's ssh configuration |
157 | file uses the "command=" option to force a particular |
158 | command to run so the actual value of the argument is |
159 | ignored. The command that's actually run merely pauses and |
160 | waits for the ssh connection to drop, then exits. |
161 | |
162 | =back |
163 | |
164 | =head1 Problems |
165 | |
166 | You should normally get a prompt that asks for the passphrase |
167 | for your RSA key when you connect with the ssh command shown |
168 | above. If you see a prompt that looks like: |
169 | |
170 | perlrep@sickle.activestate.com's password: |
171 | |
172 | Then you either don't have a ~/.ssh/identity file corresponding |
173 | to your public key, or your ~/.ssh/identity file is not readable. |
174 | Fix the problem and try again. |
175 | |
176 | =head1 Using the Perforce Client |
177 | |
178 | Remember to read the documentation for Perforce. You need |
179 | to make sure that three environment variable are set |
180 | correctly before using the p4 client with the perl repository. |
181 | |
182 | =over 4 |
183 | |
184 | =item P4PORT |
185 | |
186 | Set this to localhost:1666 (the port for your ssh client to listen on) |
187 | unless that port is already in use on your host. If it is, see |
188 | the section above on the B<-L 1666:127.0.0.1:1666> option to ssh. |
189 | |
190 | =item P4CLIENT |
191 | |
192 | The value of this is the name by which Perforce knows your |
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193 | host's workspace. You need to pick a name (normally, your |
194 | Perforce username, a dash, and your hostname) |
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195 | when you first start using the perl repository and then |
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196 | stick with it. |
197 | |
198 | Perforce keeps track of the files you have on your machine. It |
199 | does this through your client. When you first sync a version of a |
200 | file, the file comes from the server to your machine. If you sync |
201 | the same file again the server does nothing because it |
202 | knows you already have the file. |
203 | |
204 | You should NOT use the same client on different machines. If you do |
205 | you probably won't get the files you expect, and may end up with |
206 | nasty corruption. Perforce allows you to have as many clients as |
207 | you want. For example, sally-home, sally-openbsd, sally-laptop. |
208 | |
209 | Also, never change the client's root and view at the same time. |
210 | See C<http://www.perforce.com/perforce/doc.002/manuals/p4guide/04_details.html#1048341> |
211 | |
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212 | If you have multiple hosts sharing the same directory structure |
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213 | via NFS then you may be able to get away with only one client name, |
214 | but be careful. |
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215 | |
216 | The C<p4 clients> command lists all currently known clients. |
217 | |
218 | =item P4USER |
219 | |
220 | This is the username by which perforce knows you. Use your |
221 | username if you have a well known or obvious one or else pick |
222 | a new one which other perl5-porters will recognise. There is |
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223 | a licence limit on the number of these usernames, so be sure not |
224 | to use more than one. |
225 | |
226 | It is very important to set a password for your Perforce username, |
227 | or else anyone can impersonate you. Use the C<p4 passwd> command |
228 | to do this. Once a password is set for your account, you'll need |
229 | to tell Perforce what it is. You can do this by setting the |
230 | environment variable P4PASSWD, or you can use the C<-P> flag |
231 | with the C<p4> command. |
232 | |
233 | There are a few techniques you can use to avoid having to either |
234 | set an environment variable or type the password on every command. |
235 | One is to create a shell alias, for example, in bash, add something like |
236 | alias p4='p4 -P secret' |
237 | to your F<.bash_profile> file. Another way is to create a small shell |
238 | script, for example |
239 | #!/bin/bash |
240 | p4 -P secret $@ |
241 | And use this instead of running C<p4> directly. |
242 | |
243 | With either of these, be sure the file containing your password |
244 | (the F<.bash_profile> or shell script file) is only readable by you. |
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245 | |
246 | The C<p4 users> command lists all currently known users. |
247 | |
248 | =back |
249 | |
250 | Once these three environment variables are set, you can use the |
251 | perforce p4 client exactly as described in its documentation. |
252 | After setting these variables and connecting to the repository |
253 | for the first time, you should use the C<p4 user> and |
254 | C<p4 client> commands to tell perforce the details of your |
255 | new username and your new client workspace specifications. |
256 | |
257 | =head1 Ending a Repository Session |
258 | |
259 | When you have finished a session using the repository, you |
260 | should kill off the ssh client process to break the tunnel. |
261 | Since ssh forked itself into the background, you'll need to use |
262 | something like ps with the appropriate options to find the ssh |
263 | process and then kill it manually. The default signal of |
264 | SIGTERM is fine. |
265 | |
266 | =head1 Overview of the Repository |
267 | |
268 | Please read at least the introductory sections of the Perforce |
269 | User Guide (and perhaps the Quick Start Guide as well) before |
270 | reading this section. |
271 | |
272 | Every repository user typically "owns" a "branch" of the mainline |
273 | code in the repository. They hold the "pumpkin" for things in this |
274 | area, and are usually the only user who will modify files there. |
275 | This is not strictly enforced in order to allow the flexibility |
276 | of other users stealing the pumpkin for short periods with the |
277 | owner's permission. |
278 | |
279 | Here is the current structure of the repository: |
280 | |
281 | /----+-----perl - Mainline development (bleadperl) |
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282 | +-----perlio - PerlIO Pumpkin's Perl |
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283 | +-----vmsperl - VMS Pumpkin's Perl |
284 | +-----maint-5.004------perl - Maintainance branches |
285 | +-----maint-5.005------perl |
286 | +-----maint-5.6------perl |
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287 | +-----maint-5.6------pureperl |
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288 | |
289 | Perforce uses a branching model that simply tracks relationships |
290 | between files. It does not care about directories at all, so |
291 | any file can be a branch of any other file--the fully qualified |
292 | depot path name (of the form //depot/foo/bar.c) uniquely determines |
293 | a file for the purpose of establishing branching relationships. |
294 | Since a branch usually involves hundreds of files, such relationships |
295 | are typically specified en masse using a branch map (try `p4 help branch`). |
296 | `p4 branches` lists the existing branches that have been set up. |
297 | `p4 branch -o branchname` can be used to view the map for a particular |
298 | branch, if you want to determine the ancestor for a particular set of |
299 | files. |
300 | |
301 | The mainline (aka "trunk") code in the Perl repository is under |
302 | "//depot/perl/...". Most branches typically map its entire |
303 | contents under a directory that goes by the same name as the branch |
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304 | name. Thus the contents of the perlio branch are to be found |
305 | in //depot/perlio. |
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306 | |
307 | Run `p4 client` to specify how the repository contents should map to |
308 | your local disk. Most users will typically have a client map that |
309 | includes at least their entire branch and the contents of the mainline. |
310 | |
311 | Run `p4 changes -l -m10` to check on the activity in the repository. |
312 | //depot/perl/Porting/genlog is useful to get an annotated changelog |
313 | that shows files and branches. You can use this listing to determine |
314 | if there are any changes in the mainline that you need to merge into |
315 | your own branch. A typical merging session looks like this: |
316 | |
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317 | % cd ~/p4view/perlio |
318 | % p4 integrate -b perlio # to bring parent changes into perlio |
319 | % p4 resolve -am ./... # auto merge the changes |
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320 | % p4 resolve ./... # manual merge conflicting changes |
321 | % p4 submit ./... # check in |
322 | |
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323 | If the owner of the mainline wants to bring the changes in perlio |
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324 | back into the mainline, they do: |
325 | |
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326 | % p4 integrate -r -b perlio |
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327 | ... |
328 | |
329 | Generating a patch for change#42 is done as follows: |
330 | |
331 | % p4 describe -du 42 | p4desc | p4d2p > change-42.patch |
332 | |
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333 | F<p4desc> and F<>p4d2p> are to be found in //depot/perl/Porting/. |
334 | |
335 | The usual routine to apply a patch is |
336 | |
337 | % p4 edit file.c file.h |
338 | % patch < patch.txt |
339 | |
340 | (any necessary, re-Configure, make regen_headers, make clean, etc, here) |
341 | |
342 | % make all test |
343 | |
344 | (preferably make all test in several platforms and under several |
345 | different Configurations) |
346 | |
347 | % while unhappy |
348 | do |
349 | $EDITOR |
350 | make all test |
351 | done |
352 | % p4 submit |
353 | |
354 | Other useful Perforce commands |
355 | |
356 | % p4 describe -du 12345 # show change 12345 |
357 | |
358 | Note: the output of "p4 describe" is not in proper diff format, use |
359 | the F<Porting/p4d2p> to convert. |
360 | |
361 | % p4 diff -se ./... # have I modified something but forgotten |
362 | # to "p4 edit", easy faux pas with autogenerated |
363 | # files like proto.h, or if one forgets to |
364 | # look carefully which files a patch modifies |
365 | % p4 sync file.h # if someone else has modified file.h |
366 | % p4 opened # which files are opened (p4 edit) by me |
367 | % p4 opened -a # which files are opened by anybody |
368 | % p4 diff -du file.c # what changes have I done |
369 | % p4 revert file.h # never mind my changes |
370 | % p4 sync -f argh.c # forcibly synchronize your file |
371 | # from the repository |
372 | % p4 diff -sr | p4 -x - revert |
373 | # throw away (opened but) unchanged files |
374 | # (in Perforce it's a little bit too easy |
375 | # to checkin unchanged files) |
376 | |
377 | Integrate patch 12345 from the mainline to the maint-5.6 branch: |
378 | (you have to in the directory that has both the mainline and |
379 | the maint-5.6/perl as subdirectories) |
380 | |
381 | % p4 integrate -d perl/...@12345,12345 maint-5.6/perl/... |
382 | |
383 | Integrate patches 12347-12350 from the perlio branch to the mainline: |
384 | |
385 | % p4 integrate -d perlio/...@12347,12350 perl/... |
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386 | |
387 | =head1 Contact Information |
388 | |
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389 | The mail alias <perl-repository-keepers@perl.org> can be used to reach |
390 | all current users of the repository. |
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391 | |
392 | The repository keeper is currently Gurusamy Sarathy |
393 | <gsar@activestate.com>. |
394 | |
395 | =head1 AUTHORS |
396 | |
397 | Malcolm Beattie, mbeattie@sable.ox.ac.uk, 24 June 1997. |
398 | |
399 | Gurusamy Sarathy, gsar@activestate.com, 8 May 1999. |
400 | |
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401 | Slightly updated by Simon Cozens, simon@brecon.co.uk, 3 July 2000. |
402 | |
403 | More updates by Jarkko Hietaniemi, jhi@iki.fi, 28 June 2001. |
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404 | |
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405 | Perforce clarifications by Randall Gellens, rcg@users.sourceforge.net, 12 July 2001. |
406 | |
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407 | =cut |