There are two different installers provided. The older legacy installer has the extension ".run" and the newer installer has the extension ".sh". The .sh installer should be used when possible but this installer will not work on a headless installation (i.e. a Linux installation that lacks graphics libraries). If you have a headless installation then you can not use the .sh installer as there will be required dependencies that are not present.
By default, the .sh installer will present a graphical interface similar to the Windows installer. There are options to disable the graphical interface so that it can run unattended.
These are self-extracting files can be executed by double-clicking on its icon on the desktop or running it from the command line, for example:
Installation can be performed by root or by a standard user. The difference is that the product is registered in a different registry file for each: under a root installation, the product is registered inside:
while a standard user installation registers the product inside:
The registry entry stores four pieces of information, like this:
{'product': 'Helix-QAC', 'version': '<version>', 'build': '<build>','location': '/home/dandy/QAF-Test/Helix-QAC-<version>'}The default installation directory for root is set to:
But for a standard user it is set to ~/Perforce and all files will be extracted to a new sub directory under it.
This directory can be modified during the installation. The user will be prompted to confirm the default directory or enter a different path. If a new path is entered, that path will be checked for sufficient privileges. If the user doesn’t have sufficient permissions to install there, the user will be asked to enter a suitable path.
The User is also presented with a license agreement which must be agreed to for the installation to progress through to completion.