Perforce IPLM deployment and installation guide

The Perforce IPLM Deployment guide provides installation instructions for each Perforce IPLM component organized by Linux distributions.

Concepts

Perforce IPLM is a system for IP management. It has a client/server architecture. The server, also known as 'PiServer' manages a database that contains meta-data for all the IPs. Perforce IPLM has several clients - the command line client called IPLM CLI, a web client IPLM Web that runs on a standard browser, the Analog, RF, and Mixed Signal design client "VersIC", and the Perforce IPLM API.

Common abbreviations

  • MDX: Short form for Perforce. Installation directories, environment variables etc. usually have an MDX_ or mdx_ prefix
  • PI or Pi: Short form for Perforce IPLM

Perforce IPLM clients

Perforce IPLM data is accessed through one of the available clients. IPLM Web is a client that is accessed via a standard web browser. To access this client, the user simply types 'http://<URL>' in any standard browser.

The command line client (or 'picli') is accessed by typing 'pi' on a unix terminal. To setup PiCLI:

  1. Set the 'MDX_PI_SERVER' environment variable to point to the Perforce IPLM host and port. For example, 'export MDX_PI_SERVER=http://mdx-piserver'
  2. Add the Perforce IPLM binary to the PATH - found in the 'Perforce IPLM installation dir' + /bin

See Accessing Perforce IPLM for additional details.

Users and Groups

Each user in Perforce IPLM needs a separate login. Perforce IPLM authenticates individual users via a 'login' command. Perforce IPLM is licensed on a per-user basis, so each user can have any number of active IPs and workspaces in the system. For more on users and authentication, refer to the Users and Groups page.

Deployment Planning

Perforce IPLM Server (PiServer)

The Perforce IPLM Server is installed via packaged installation on a dedicated server machine. Recommended specifications for this machine can be found here. Choose the page corresponding to your Linux distribution in the Perforce Package Installation section, and follow the instructions to install the server. See the PiServer Administration page for more details.

Perforce IPLM CLI

The Perforce IPLM CLI can be installed either via a packaged installation as with the server, or via a Self-Extracting Archive installation. The packaged install might be used on the dedicated server machine, whereas the Self-Extracting Archive installation is likely more appropriate for deployment on an NFS share for use by client machines as it is fully self contained. In either case the version of the client should match the version of the server.

The client installation scripts in the PiExtras package can be used to do the initial install of the Self-Extracting Archive version of the client install (as well as installing VersIC.)

Perforce IPLM Web

The Perforce IPLM Web Client should be installed on the same machine as the Perforce IPLM Server. It will automatically find and connect to the Server. The Perforce IPLM Web Client is installed via packaged install, choose the page corresponding to your Linux distribution and follow the instructions to install the web client. See the IPLM Web administration page for more details.

PiExtras

The Piextras package contains a number of useful items (see here for more details):

  1. Tutorial installation scripts which will set up commit (and if desired edge) perforce servers and import the corresponding tutorial data into a pre-installed Perforce IPLM Server
  2. Client installation scripts which will download and configure VersIC for use in a client setup
  3. Bulk IP import and configuration scripts
  4. Perforce IPLM/Perforce Permissions synchronization scripts
  5. A number of other utility scripts

The Piextras package can be installed via packaged installation or via a Self-Extracting Archive Installation.

IPLM Cache

The IPLM Cache server manages a read only IP cache that increase the speed of workspace loading and reduces disk space usage. More details can be found on the IPLM Cache administration page.

2.6 VersIC Analog/RF/Mixed Signal Design Client

VersIC can be installed and updated with the client installation scripts provided with the PiExtras package.