The document discusses updates to Perforce's version control system products in the 2017.1 release. Major changes include infrastructure for Helix4Git to allow Git repositories to be stored natively, network performance improvements for high latency connections in Helix Core, and usability enhancements in Helix Swarm focused on larger installations.

1. Helix Version Control
System Updates
What's New in our 2017.1 Releases
Sven Erik Knop,
Principal Solutions Engineer at Perforce Software

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What’s New in the Helix Version Control System

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• Once there was Perforce
(also known as P4 or P4D)
• Then the product was
rebranded as Helix
• There are now many different
products under the Helix brand
Helix Core?
HelixIM
HelixTCMHelixRM
Helix4Git
HelixSwarm
HelixCore
Helix VE
Helix Core is now the official name for P4D

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DESIGNER DEVELOPER
GIT
CONNECTOR
GITLAB EE
ANY GIT TOOL
Helix Version Control System
File Level Access
Large files, more than just code
1,000’s of contributors across the globe
Large scale code review and collaboration
Integrated with version control events
Included as part of Helix Core license
Accelerates CI pipeline
Many Git repos; multiple projects
Built-in mirroring

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Agenda
Helix Core
Improvements Overview
1
Helix 4Git Overview
2
Helix Core
Improvement Details
3
Helix Swarm
Improvements & Details
4
Questions & Answers
5

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• Major changes
• Infrastructure for Helix4Git
• Network performance
improvements for Helix Core
• Minor changes in Helix Core
• p4 remotes –u
• p4 move -r
• p4 renameuser across edge servers
• security level 5 and 6
• additional structured log:
auditsize.csv
So what is new in the Versioning Engine?

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• The Versioning Engine can now store Git repositories natively
• Work began in 2016.2
• New solution – Helix4Git
• Upgrade message
• 2017.1: perform upgrades on GraphDepot data required for 2017.1.
• Adds new depot type ‘graph’
• Additional commands for the Git ‘kitchen sink’
• Separate Webinar on Helix4Git details next week
Helix4Git

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• New server level (http://answers.perforce.com/articles/KB/3194):
• Server Level: 43
• Client Protocol: 82
• Upgrade Counter: 27
• 2017.1 adds new tables for Helix4Git
• 2017.1 upgrades one table: db.domain
• Expected to be a quick operation
Helix Core Details

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• Performance improvement through auto tuning of buffer sizes
• Currently Unix only
• Windows users can still use net.tcpsize to manually tune buffers
• Expect performance improvement if
• You have a high latency network connection
• Your network buffer sizes have not been optimally tuned yet
• You have no WAN accelerator in place
• Automatically enabled, can be disabled by setting ‘net.autotune=0’
Helix Core Networking improvements

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Before After Improvement
362 minutes 27 minutes 13x
Server: 10-20x file-transfer performance improvements
over high latency network
Before After Improvement
350 minutes 21 minutes 16x
Before After Improvement
278 minutes 24 minutes 11x
Submit over 2K files (16 GB) changelist to remote server
Sync over 2K (16 GB) workspace from remote server
Submit 10 GB file to Edge server (Client->Edge->Commit server)
All tests performed with 200 ms roundtrip latency on a 1 Gbps link, and with client and server running under Linux
1
2
3

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Command/Option Comment
p4 remotes –u <user> Filter by user name, useful if many users set up remotes
p4 move –r Combines opening a file for edit and rename in one command
p4 renameuser Restriction for edge servers are removed
Workspaces still need to be reloaded first
security=5 and security=6 Additional security levels that require P4Proxy to use a service user
serverlog.file.x=auditsize.csv Additional structured log to replace audit.csv. Adds file size to the log
Minor improvements
More details in https://www.perforce.com/perforce/doc.current/user/relnotes.txt

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• p4 configure set security=5
• Requires intermediary servers to log in to the master server with a service user
• Prevents users from setting up a P4Proxy without admin’s knowledge
• p4 configure set security=6
• Same as security=5, but also requires a valid server spec with a matching
service user
• AllowedAddressed field must contain the IP address of the installed
intermediary server.
• Any errors will be logged in the structured log route.csv
Security level 5 and 6

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• The new Swarm release is
aimed at Enterprise features
• PHP7 support for newer platforms
and higher performance
• Action Items dashboard
• Customizable notifications
• Review Filters
• Miscellaneous
• Remove pending/shelved
changelists (if enabled)
• Emails contain Swarm specific
headers for user filtering
• Change ownership of a Review
(if enabled)
Helix Swarm 2017.1

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Conclusion
Helix Core 2017.1
has significant network
performance improvement and
usability enhancements
Helix Swarm 2017.1
is focused on usability for
larger installations with
many users
Versioning Engine now support Helix4Git (separate webinar)

21. Questions?
Thank you very much for your attendance!