A Word of Caution on Windows Zip Utilities

Be careful when using WinZip® or PKZIP® on a Windows machine to move a workspace, reference tree, or depot. You may want to use tar on a UNIX/Linux machine to “pack up” a directory tree, and then use the Zip utility on a Windows machine to “unpack” it.

• When moving the entire repository or an individual depot, be sure to disable conversion of line-terminators during the “unpack” step:

  • In WinZip, make sure the option “TAR file smart CR/LF conversion” is not selected (Options > Configuration > Miscellaneous).
  • In PKZIP, make sure the “CR/LF conversion” setting is “None — No conversion” (Options > Extract).

Enabling conversion of line-terminators during the “unpack” step will corrupt the text files in a depot's file storage area (see Storage Layout). The AccuRev Server always expects lines in these text files to be terminated with a single LF character, no matter what kind of machine the server is running on.

• Conversely, when moving a workspace or reference tree, you may wish to enable “TAR file smart CR/LF conversion”. The files in a workspace or reference tree are handled directly by text-editors, compilers, testing tools, etc. Many Windows text-editors are incapable of handling text files whose lines are terminated with a single LF character.

• Zip utilities typically refuse to copy files that are open at the operating system level. Typically, you can work around this limitation by stopping the accurev_server program, but this defeats AccuRev’s “live backup” feature.