Caveats, warnings, and recommendations

Although the material in this section has already been presented elsewhere in this chapter, it is important enough to bear repeating. When editing job specifications with p4 jobspec, follow these guidelines.

• Do not attempt to change, rename, or redefine fields 101 through 105. These fields are used by Helix Server and should not be deleted or changed. Use p4 jobspec only to add new fields (106 and above) to your jobs.

  Field 101 is required by Helix Server and cannot be renamed nor deleted.

  Fields 102 through 105 are reserved for use by Helix Server applications. Although it is possible to rename or delete these fields, it is highly undesirable to do so. Helix Server applications may continue to set the value of field 102 (the Status: field) to closed (or some other value defined in the Presets: for field 102) upon changelist submission, even if the administrator has redefined field 102 for use as a field that does not contain closed as a permissible value, leading to unpredictable and confusing results.

• After a field has been created and jobs have been entered, do not change the field’s ID number. Any data entered in that field through p4 job will be inaccessible.
• Field names can be changed at any time. When changing a field’s name, be sure to also change the field name in other p4 jobspec fields that reference this field name. For example, if you create a new field 106 named severity and subsequently rename it to bug-severity, then the corresponding line in the jobspec’s Presets: field must be changed to bug-severity to reflect the change.
• The comments that you write in the Comments: field are the only way to let your users know the requirements for each field. Make these comments understandable and complete. These comments are also used to display tooltips in P4V, the Helix Visual Client.