The p4 typemap command allows Perforce administrators to set up a table linking Perforce file types to file name specifications. If a filename matches an entry in the typemap table, it overrides the file type that would otherwise have been assigned by the Perforce client.
By default, Perforce automatically determines if a file is of type text or
binary based on an analysis of the first 8192 bytes of a file. If the high bit is clear in each of the first 8192 bytes, Perforce assumes it to be
text; otherwise, it's
binary.
Although this default behavior can be overridden by the use of the -t filetype flag, it's easy to overlook this, particularly in cases where files' types were usually (but not always) detected correctly. The most common examples of this are associated with PDF files (which sometimes begin with over 8192 bytes of ASCII comments) and RTF files, which usually contain embedded formatting codes.
The p4 typemap command provides a more complete solution, allowing administrators to bypass the default type detection mechanism, ensuring that certain files (for example, those ending in
.pdf or
.rtf) will always be assigned the desired Perforce filetype upon addition to the depot.
The p4 typemap form contains a single
TypeMap: field, consisting of pairs of values linking file types to file patterns specified in depot syntax:
To tell the Perforce server to regard all PDF and RTF files as binary, use
p4 typemap to modify the typemap table as follows:
Typemap: binary //....pdf binary //....rtf
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The first three periods ("...") in the specification are a Perforce wildcard specifying that all files beneath the root directory are included as part of the mapping. The fourth period and the file extension specify that the specification applies to files ending in "
.pdf" (or "
.rtf")
A more complicated situation might arise in a site where users in one area of the depot use the extension
.doc for plain ASCII text files containing documentation, and users working in another area use
.doc to refer to files in a binary file format used by a popular word processor. A useful typemap table in this situation might be:
Typemap: text //depot/dev_projects/....doc binary //depot/corporate/annual_reports/....doc
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To enable keyword expansion for all .c and
.h files, but disable it for your
.txt files, do the following:
Typemap: binary //depot/dev_projects/main/bin/... binary+m //depot/dev_projects/main/bin/thirdpartydll/...
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All files at or below the bin directory are assigned type
binary. Because later mappings override earlier mappings, files in the
bin/thirdpartydll subdirectory are assigned type
binary+m instead. For more information about the
+m (modtime) file type modifier, see the
File Types section.
By default, Perforce supports concurrent development, but environments in which only one person is expected to have a file for edit at a time can implement pessimistic locking by using the
+l (exclusive open) modifier as a partial filetype. If you use the following typemap, the
+l modifier is automatically applied to all newly-added files in the depot:
