Release Notes

Windows - Visual Studio 2022 plugin: Show semantic information in CodeLens

This new release enhances the plugin for Visual Studio 2022 showing semantic information above every class, method or property in your Plastic SCM projects!

The CodeLens annotations above every class, method or property in files controlled by Plastic SCM will show semantic information about its last change. This includes the change type, user who modified it, and change date.

Keep in mind that this feature will only show up in semantic-available files (C#, C, C++) that are in a Plastic SCM Workspace.

See it for yourself!

Screenshot

Screenshot

Screenshot

This new feature will be installed as part of the Visual Studio 2022 Plastic SCM extension if you select the option during the Plastic SCM installation process. Once installed, the Plastic SCM CodeLens provider can be enable/disable from Tools > Options > Text Editor - All Languages - CodeLens > Show Plastic SCM

Screenshot

Windows - Visual Studio 2022 plugin: Show semantic history in CodeLens

This new release takes the CodeLens information in the plugin for Visual Studio 2022 a step further. When you create the Plastic SCM data point above a method, property or type, it will display a list of up to 10 of the last changes in that element. This leverages the semantic technologies in Plastic SCM, showing only changes in the file that affect the annotated element.

Keep in mind that this feature will only show up in semantic-available files (C#, C, C++) that are in a Plastic SCM Workspace.

Take a look here!

Screenshot

This new feature will be installed as part of the Visual Studio 2022 Plastic SCM extension if you select the option during the Plastic SCM installation process. Once installed, the Plastic SCM CodeLens provider can be enable/disable from Tools > Options > Text Editor - All Languages - CodeLens > Show Plastic SCM

Command-line client: Pagination/sorting added to 'cm find' command.

Every find object now complies with pagination, defining a 'limit' and an 'offset' to manage the result size and starting point. In addition, some objects (branch, changeset, label, review) will comply with 'order by' clause. Please, kindly refer to the 'cm find --help' and 'cm help showfindobjects' for further details.

For instance, the following command:

cm find label "where owner='me' limit 10 offset 20" 

Displays the 10 labels starting from the 21st where I am the owner.

Another example could be:

cm find branches "where owner='me' order by branchname desc limit 10"

Displays the first 10 branches I created, sorted by name in descendant order.

GitSync: Added '--gitpushchunk' parameter to export Plastic repositories to Git in smaller chunks.

This parameter allows to process the push operation (exporting changes from Plastic to Git) in chunks of a certain number of changesets instead of sending all the changes in one single package.

This is only useful for huge repos to avoid network or package size related issues or just for debugging purposes. It uses chunks of 1000 changesets if no value is specified.

cm sync myrepo@server:8087 git https://github.com/rubarax/repo.git --gitpushchunk
cm sync myrepo@server:8087 git https://github.com/rubarax/repo.git --gitpushchunk=100

All platforms - PlasticX: New GUI Announcement

You're invited to check out the new Plastic GUI - a sneak peek at the work we've been doing to continuously improve the Plastic experience for all users, regardless of experience level. The new Plastic GUI is now the default GUI for MacOS and Linux. It is also discoverable in the bottom left corner of the Windows GUI.

This new GUI is cross-platform, includes a dark theme and provides better syntax highlighting. Many more improvements are coming soon, including Gluon support! Try out the new experience and switch back to the Legacy GUI at any time.

To try out the new GUI simply click on the "Switch to new GUI" text near the bottom of the side panel, as shown in these screenshots:

Switch to new GUI button Linux:

Screenshot

Switch to new GUI button macOS:

Screenshot

Switch to new GUI button Windows:

Screenshot

Welcome to new GUI:

Screenshot

You can switch back to the legacy GUI at any time by selecting the option shown here:

Switch to legacy GUI:

Screenshot

Command-line client: Updated the Spanish command-line help for several commands.

We keep on updating the Spanish documentation of the command-line help. These are the commands whose Spanish documentation has been completely updated on this round:

* log

* ls

* manipulateselector

* merge

* attribute create

* attribute delete

* attribute edit

* attribute rename

* attribute set

* attribute unset

* branch create

* branch delete

* branch history

* branch rename

* branch showmain

* branch showmerges

* repository

* repository add

* repository create

* repository delete

* repository list

* repository rename

* trigger

* trigger create

* trigger delete

* trigger list

All clients: The performance of the status operation was improved again!

The overall time of the status operation is a 60% faster. This is only super-noticeable with huge workspaces (>4M of files), when the watcher is enabled and after the first status runs. Otherwise, the time spent in disk operations makes the improvement less noticeable.

After all the improvements done, the status time goes from 7.1s to 2.7s!

The tests were done:

* using a workspace of 4011530 files, 264143 directories and 264 GB.

* in an e2-standard-8 (Google Cloud) instance with a debian-10 image and a SSD persistent disk.

Command-line client: Changelist info is displayed along with the controlled changes in status command

When using --changelist options in status command, now it shows at the top of every grouped section of changes the information regarding the changelist owning these changes. The "--machinereadable status" option now works along with --changelist.

For instance: considering a workspace with two files (BoxCollider.cpp, and StartGameBtn.cpp), each one added to its corresponding changelist (Physics, GUI), the following command:

cm status --changelist=Physics

Will display something similar to this as far as there is a controlled change in BoxCollider.cpp file:

/main@VideogameEngine@localhost:8084 (cs:1 - head)

Changelist: Physics:Every change related to physic calculations in the engine
Changed
Status         Size       Last Modified    Path
Checked-out    7 bytes    4 minutes ago    BoxCollider.cpp

And the following command...

cm status --changelist=Physics --machinereadable --fieldseparator=_ --startlineseparator=. --endlineseparator=,

.. will display something similar to this as far as there is a controlled change in BoxCollider.cpp file:

.STATUS_1_VideogameEngine_localhost:8084,
.CHLIST_Physics_Every change related to physic calculations in the engine,
.CO_C:wkspacesVideogameEngineWKBoxCollider.cpp,

Command-line client: Allow creating multi-line comments

Allows the use of the escape sequences 'n' and 'rn' to be used in checkin comments to generate line returns. Previously these would not be interpreted as escape sequences and would be included literally in the comment.

Command-line client: Allow the '--xml=output_file' parameter in the 'cm find' command.

Before, you needed to specify '--xml --file=output_file' to print the find result to a file. Now, you can just use '--xml=output_file' like other commands do.

All platforms - DevOps: Trunkbot auto enqueue branches when new changes in dst branch.

Before this version, if new changesets reach your trunk branch (i.e., '/main' branch) while a merge changeset -changes of your own branch and the trunk branch- is being built & tested, it won't be possible to merge the branch.

Now you can set up your Trunkbot configuration to queue the affected branch again automatically, and hence repeating all the branch processing, including the last changes from trunk branch in the merge changeset.

You can enable this feature in the mergebot configuration:

Screenshot

Server: Added a new before-merge variable for the destination branch

The environment variable PLASTIC_MERGE_DESTINATION_BRANCH has been added to the "before-merge" trigger. It contains the name of the destination branch for the merge.

All platforms - Plastic, PlasticX: support environment variables in custom tool configuration

You can now include environment variables when defining custom actions that can be launched from the context menu.

See the documentation about configuring external tools.

* Example:

In the configuration file 'externaltools.conf':

item | My custom tool | %PATH_TO_TOOL_EXE% | @object

This will create a menu item "My custom tool" under the "Open" menu of the Workspace Explorer which will open the selected path using the executable pointed to by the environment variable "PATH_TO_TOOL_EXE".

You can add multiple external tools - just add a line to the config file for each one.

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Unity files considered as text by default

We added the following extensions to our list of known text extensions, and now they will be considered as text files by default:

.anim
.asmdef
.asset
.controller
.giparams
.mat
.meta
.mixer
.overrideController
.physicMaterial
.playable
.prefab
.scenetemplate
.shadergraph
.shadervariants
.signal
.spriteatlas
.unity
.uss
.uxml

Also, the following file will be considered as a binary file by default:

LightingData.asset

Remember that you can override this behavior, adding your custom extensions, by modifying your filetypes.conf file. Learn more about it here: Custom file types

All platforms - All clients: The status operation performance has been improved by changing how the stats times are tracked (again :).

This is only noticeable in super-huge workspaces (> 4M of files).

The overall time of the status operation is a 10% faster, but this is only noticeable when the watcher is enabled and after the first status run.

In this particular case the 'cm status' went from 6s to 5.4s.

Command-line client: Updated the Spanish command-line help for several commands.

We keep on updating the Spanish documentation of the command-line help. These are the commands whose Spanish documentation has been completely updated on this round:

* api

* findchanged

* findcheckouts

* findprivate

* getconfig

* getfile

* getrevision

* getstatus

* gettaskbranches

* getworkspacefrompath

* help

* history

* iostats

* issuetracker

* licenseinfo

* linktask

* listusers

* location

* lock

* lock list

* lock unlock

* wi

All Platforms - Server: Improved the plasticd shell start up time

plasticd shell uses communication files to interact with the server. The problem came when these files became too big (> 1GB). It could take more than 10 min to connect with the server.

Now, it does a smart reading starting from the end of the communication file, so it doesn't depend on the size of the file. It always takes around 1-2 seconds to connect.

Command-line client: Updated the help for the cm archive command.

We removed the --comment option from the help of the cm archive command because it's not available.

If you want to assign a comment to the 'archive' operation, please use the -c option.

For example:

 cm archive bigfile.zip#br:/main -c="volume00"

Windows - Command line client: netcore-compiled command line client for Windows!

From now on, the command line client (cm) will be a netcore-based application, replacing the netframework-based command line client.

This also unlocks new cm subcommands that were just available for netcore flavor, like cm api subcommand (see release note below).

Enjoy!

Windows - Plastic SCM API: The Plastic SCM API is now embedded in the CLI!

We created a new cm api command that starts the Plastic SCM API. It allows the same arguments as the old plasticapi.exe application (we removed this deprecated executable from the installer).

The previous versions (10.0.16.6419, 10.0.16.6443) already had this cm api command, but just for Linux and macOS. From now on, Windows will have also this command available.

Find more info about it via the command help:

cm api --help

And see more usage details at: https://www.plasticscm.com/documentation/restapi/plastic-scm-version-control-rest-api-guide

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: The Checkin endpoint now supports partial workspaces

We extended the Checkin endpoint in the Plastic SCM API to support partial workspaces. You will now be able to perform checkin operations in a partial workspace using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/checkin with a JSON body like this:

{
    "paths": ["path-to-my-file", "path-to-another-file"],
    "comment": "my current changes for my task"
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New endpoint to retrieve file info is now available

We created a new endpoint in the Plastic SCM REST API to retrieve information from a file. You will now be able to perform [console]fileinfo[/console] operations in your workspace, using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a GET request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/fileinfo/path-to-the-file-to-get-info.

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: The Update endpoint now supports partial workspaces

We extended the Update endpoint in the Plastic SCM API to support partial workspaces. You will now be able to perform update operations in a partial workspace using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/update.

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: The Switch endpoint now supports partial workspaces

We extended the Switch endpoint in the Plastic SCM API to support partial workspaces. You will now be able to perform switch operations to branch or changeset in a partial workspace using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/switch with a JSON body like this:

{
    "objectType": "branch",
    "object": "main"
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New revert endpoint for regular and partial workspaces

We created a new Revert endpoint in the Plastic SCM API. You will now be able to perform revert operations in your workspace, partial or otherwise, using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/revert/{my_item_to_revert} with a JSON body like this:

{
    "changeset": 28
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New partial configure endpoint for partial workspaces

A new Partial Configure endpoint has been added to the Plastic SCM API. Using this client-side REST API you will now be able to perform partial configure operations in your partial workspace.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/partialconfigure with a JSON body like this:

{
    "instructions": [
        {
            "path": "/",
            "action": "unload"
        },
        {
            "path": "/",
            "action": "load"
        }
    ]
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New merge endpoint for regular workspaces

We created a new Merge endpoint in the Plastic SCM REST API. You will now be able to perform merge operations in your workspace, using this client-side REST API. This operation doesn't support conflict resolution at the moment.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/merge with a JSON body like this:

{
    "sourceSpec": "br:/main/mybranch"
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New endpoint to undelete removed elements is now available

We created a new undelete endpoint in the Plastic SCM REST API. You will now be able to perform undelete operations in your workspace, using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/undelete with a JSON body like this:

{
    "revSpec": "rev:itemid:4689#cs:23",
    "path": "my_file"
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New create shelve endpoint for regular workspaces

We created a new Create Shelve endpoint in the Plastic SCM API. You will now be able to create a new shelve from changes in your workspace, using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a POST request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/shelvesets with a JSON body like this:

{
    "comment": "my amazing shelve comment",
    "paths": ["path-to-my-file", "path-to-another-file"]
}

All platforms - Plastic SCM API: New endpoint to apply shelvesets is now available

We created a new Apply Shelve endpoint in the Plastic SCM API. You will now be able to apply a shelve in your workspace, using this client-side REST API.

Just launch the cm api command and perform a PATCH request to endpoint /api/v1/wkspaces/{wkName}/shelvesets/31 to apply shelve 31.

All platforms - GitSync: main branch support improvements

Now cm sync autodetects if your Git repository uses "main" or "master" as the main branch.

You can explicitly tell it to use any branch as main branch with --mainbranch:

cm sync REPO@SERVER git https://github.com/GITREPO.git --mainbranch=trunk

All platforms - Client: cm update now supports a machine readable format

To obtain an easily parseable output, just use the --machinereadable option:

$ cm update --machinereadable --verbose

<C:/workspace/CreatedDir>
<U:/workspace/UpdatedDir>
<D:/workspace/ModifiedDir>
<C:/workspace/createdfile.txt>
<U:/workspace/updatedfile.txt>
<M:/workspace/modifiedfile.txt>
<D:/workspace/deletedfile.txt>
<SAME_REV:/workspace/untouchedfile.txt> # Only in verbose mode.

Remember you can override the default separators by using formatting options. You might need to double quote them depending on your shell:

$ cm update "--startlineseparator=<" "--endlineseparator=>" "--fieldseparator=:"

All platforms - Client: cm partial update now supports a machine readable format

To obtain an easily parseable output, just use the --machinereadable option:

$ cm partial update --machinereadable

STAGE Plastic is updating your workspace. Wait a moment, please...
STAGE Updated 0 bytes of 41.68 MB (0 of 3 files to download / 0 of 3 operations to apply) /file.txt
...

Remember you can override the default separators by using formatting options. You might need to double quote them depending on your shell:

$ cm partial update "--startlineseparator=[" "--endlineseparator=]" "--fieldseparator=:"

[STAGE:Plastic is updating your workspace. Wait a moment, please...]
[STAGE:Updated 0 bytes of 41.68 MB (0 of 3 files to download / 0 of 3 operations to apply):/file.txt]
...

All platforms - All clients: The status operation performance has been improved by changing how the stats times are tracked (again :).

This is only noticeable in super-huge workspaces (> 4M of files).

The overall time of the status operation is a 15% faster, but this is only noticeable when the watcher is enabled and after the first status run.

In this case, the 'cm status' went from 7.1s to 6s.

All platforms - Client: cm partial ci now supports machine readable format

To obtain an easily parseable output, just use the --machinereadable option:

$ cm partial ci --machinereadable file.txt | program

Or alternatively:

$ cm partial ci --machinereadable file.txt > /path/to/output.txt
$ cat /path/to/output.txt

CI_START
STAGE  -
STAGE  -  0.00 of 13.89 MB
STAGE Multi-thread checkin -  0.00 of 13.89 MB
...

Remember you can override the default separators by using formatting options. You might need to double-quote them depending on your shell:

$ cm partial ci --machinereadable "--startlineseparator=[" "--endlineseparator=]" "--fieldseparator=:" file.txt > /path/to/output.txt

[CI_START]
[STAGE: - ]
[STAGE: -  0.00 of 13.89 MB]
[STAGE:Multi-thread checkin -  0.00 of 13.89 MB]

Windows - Visual Studio Plugin: Plastic SCM now supports new Visual Studio 2022!!!

Installer now shows a new plugin for Visual Studio 2022 and above. As the IDE turned 64 bits, it required a new version of our plugin, which by the way can coexist with the old one, just in case you want to keep both Visual Studio 2019 and 2022 installed in your system.

Screenshot

As usual, if Visual Studio 2022 is present in the system, the extension will be suggested to be installed by default.

macOS, Linux - Plastic SCM API: The Plastic SCM API is now embedded in the CLI!

We created a new cm api command that starts the Plastic SCM API. It allows the same arguments as the old plasticapi.exe application. See more usage details here

Warning: this command is only available in macOS and Linux, as those platforms run our new .NET Core CLI client. We removed plasticapi.exe from all installers, so the Plastic SCM API is temporarily unsupported in Windows. It will be back as soon as we distribute our .NET Core CLI client in the Windows installers.

All platforms - Server: The Jet storage backend is now faster when reading files.

We changed the way we access the Jet backend files for reading. This change decreases the time needed for just reading content, making the overall time of reading calls to the server lower.

All platforms - All clients: The status operation performance has been improved by changing how the stats times are tracked.

This is only noticeable in super-huge workspaces.

The overall time of the status operation is a 17% faster in a workspace with 1M of directories and 5M of files.

All platforms - server: more detailed information in the relevant log and shell's 'htop' regarding internal and Web UI method calls.

Previously, every internal method call was tagged as "Internal", both for the server stats (relevant log) and shell's htop command. Now these calls are more qualified displaying the name of the method in execution. It has been also fixed on "ChannelCall" log where these calls are no longer tagged as "WebUI" but as "webui-Method'sName"

For example: on shell's htop, after executing a long-enough-lasting task (for instance a huge merge to) it should display "MergeTo" under Active requests or "webui-MergeTo", relying on the source of the method call. Remember that if the call is executed too fast, htop might not be updated in between and therefore not displaying any method at all.

All platforms - CLI: Checkout CLI command (co) now supports --machinereadable

We added the possibility of using --machinereadable parameter to the checkout command. Now it will be possible to specify --machinereadable argument to configure special chars which will be inserted where needed:

"--machinereadable" -> Outputs the result in an easy-to-parse format.

"--startlineseparator" -> Used with the '--machinereadable' flag, specifies how the lines should start.

"--endlineseparator" -> Used with the '--machinereadable' flag, specifies how the lines should end.

"--fieldseparator" -> Used with the '--machinereadable' flag, specifies how the fields should be separated.

Execution example:

cm co . --machinereadable --startlineseparator=">"
The selected items are about to be checked out. Please wait ...
>XXXXXXXXXX Item XXXXXXXXXXXX was correctly checked out
CommandResult 0

(Checkouts the current directory, and prints the result in a simplified, easier-to-parse format, starting the lines with the specified strings.)

All platforms - Client: cm partial configure now supports a machine readable format

To obtain an easily parseable output, just use the "--machinereadable" option:

$ cm partial configure --machinereadable +/file.txt

STAGE Plastic is updating your workspace. Wait a moment, please...
STAGE Calculating...
STAGE Updated 0 bytes of 13.89 MB (0 of 1 files to download / 0 of 1 operations to apply)
STAGE Updated 13.89 MB of 13.89 MB (0 of 1 files to download / 0 of 1 operations to apply):/file1.txt

Remember you can override the default separators by using formatting options. You might need to double quote them depending on your shell:

$ cm partial configure --machinereadable "--startlineseparator=[" "--endlineseparator=]" "--fieldseparator=:" +/file.txt

[STAGE:Plastic is updating your workspace. Wait a moment, please...]
[STAGE:Calculating...]
[STAGE:Updated 0 bytes of 13.89 MB (0 of 1 files to download / 0 of 1 operations to apply)]
[STAGE:Updated 13.89 MB of 13.89 MB (0 of 1 files to download / 0 of 1 operations to apply):/file1.txt]

All platforms - Plastic: Alpha new and Alpha bug release notes in help panels

We added two new categories to the release notes: Alpha new, and Alpha bug. They already appeared in the web (https://www.plasticscm.com/download/releasenotes), but now you will also see them in the plastic client, inside the new version notification. Check it out:

Screenshot

Command-line client: We keep on updating the Spanish documentation of the command-line help.

Now, it was time for the following commands to be completely updated and match the English version of the command-line help:

* acl

* activateuser

* addignorepattern

* admin

* admin readonly

* applylocal

* archive

* attribute

* changelist

* changepassword

* changerevisiontype

* changeset

* changeset delete

* changeset editcomment

* changeset move

* checkconnection

* checkdatabase

* checkselectorsyntax

* codereview

* crypt

* deactivateuser

* diffmetrics

* fast-export

* fast-import

* fileinfo

* find

* trigger edit

We're still working on the rest of the commands, so stay tuned!

Command-line client: We're updating the Spanish version of the command-line help.

The documentation of these commands is now completely updated and match the English version of the command-line help:

* add

* annotate

* branch

* checkin

* checkout

* clone

* diff

* undo

* update

We're still working on the rest of the commands, so stay tuned!

All platforms - WebAdmin: On the License configuration area, the button that takes you to sign up in plasticscm.com when you don't have a license in place now takes you to your licenses. Before it just took you to the sign up form.

All platforms - Plastic: Triggers no longer wait if parent process has exited and a child process is invoked.

Previously, triggers that launched a child process would wait for it to exit before returning. Now they allow the child process to run in the background while the trigger returns.

Command line client: cm archive command help improvements

Added more information and examples about the required use of the externaldata.conf file when unarchiving (restoring) an archived revision.

New samples:

 1) Archive one revision:                                                                          
    cm archive Assets/RoofTextures/Textures/Wooden_Roof_05.png --file=/Users/ruben/archive/battle  
 2) See the archived revision in the specified output path:                                        
    ls -al /Users/ruben/archive/battle*                                                            
    -rw-r--r--  1 ruben  staff  2220039 Nov  9 10:52 /Users/ruben/archive/battle-100280-167        
                                                                                                   
 Unarchive (restore) example:                                                                      
 1) Add the output archive folder to the externaldata.conf file:                                   
    vi /Users/ruben/.plastic4/externaldata.conf                                                    
    /Users/ruben/archive                                                                           
 2) Unarchive the revision:                                                                        
    cm archive Assets/RoofTextures/Textures/Wooden_Roof_05.png --restore                           

Command-line client: Updated the cm partial add documentation to include the formatting arguments.

Now, the cm partial add help includes the --format and --errorformat arguments. The help shows you how to use these arguments to retrieve the output in a specific format when adding items to a partial workspace.

For example:

cm partial add -R * --format="ADD {0}" --errorformat="ERR {0}"

Command-line client: Updated the cm lock list documentation to include the "machine readable" arguments.

Now, the cm lock list help includes the --machinereadable , --startlineseparator, --endlineseparator, and --fieldseparator arguments. The help shows you how to use these arguments to output the result in an easy-to-parse format.

For example:

cm lock list --machinereadable --startlineseparator=">" --endlineseparator="<" --fieldseparator=","

All platforms Server: New ThreadPool boosting system to avoid long waiting requests

The server allows creating new threads to attend to the requests and goes beyond the max thread limit if needed.

Before this task, the boosting mechanism handles the slow requests (calls running for too long) and the too many requests waiting.

Now it also handles when the request is waiting for too long. It's helpful on the following scenario:

The server receives a high number of requests for a while. It's able to attend almost all of them with the current threads but not all, so the request queue starts growing little by little.

The old mechanism detects it when the queue grows too much. But this new mechanism detects it much earlier, improving the server responsiveness.

All platforms - client: Parallel download for big files now available!

Big files are stored in blocks, and now each block can be downloaded in parallel, achieving an incredible speed up.

We tested downloading a 560 MB file from Plastic Cloud using a 600mbps connection and now the speed is 2.5 times faster.

All platforms - Command line client: cm find branch allows formatting using the branch guid.

Previously running "cm find branch --format={guid}" returned an error since the guid was unsupported as a format field, it now prints the branch guid.

All platforms: Client: 27% less memory during the update operation

We worked on saving memory allocations on the client core, and finally, we were able to reduce up to 27% of the total allocations during an update operation.

Find some numbers here: We ran a 'cm update' to download 8GB of data and:

* Before: cm allocated 636MB

* After: cm allocated only 460MB (27% less)

All platforms - Cloud: Archiving revisions is now available in Cloud!

You can reduce the size (and the costs :)) of your cloud repositories by archiving revisions to an external storage.

Check the whole archive documentation here.

In summary, we can simply archive one revision as follows:

cm archive Assets/RoofTextures/Textures/Wooden_Roof_05.png --file=/Users/ruben/archive/battle
Total 2.131 Mb. Comp. 2.117 Mb
Command finished successfully

After executing the command, we can see the archived revision in the specified output path:

ls -al /Users/ruben/archive/battle*
-rw-r--r--  1 ruben  staff  2220039 Nov  9 10:52 /Users/ruben/archive/battle-100280-167

To unarchive the revision, firstly, we need to add the output archive folder to the externaldata.conf file:

vi /Users/ruben/.plastic4/externaldata.conf
/Users/ruben/archive

and run the command to unarchive the revision:

cm archive Assets/RoofTextures/Textures/Wooden_Roof_05.png --restore
Total 2.131 Mb. Comp. 2.117 Mb
Command finished successfully

And that's all :).

Now, let's answer some questions:

How can I archive all the revisions bigger than 10 MB?

Very easy! Just find for the revisions bigger than 10MB in the repo and pass them to the 'cm archive' command as follows:

cm archive $(cm find "revs where size > 10000000 on repository 'repo@org@cloud'" --format=rev:revid:{id}@repo@org@cloud  --nototal | paste -sd " " -) --file=/external/archive

Remark: the 'cm archive' command also supports pipe to receive arguments from the standard input as follows:

cm find "revs where size > 10000000 on repository 'repo@org@cloud'" --format=rev:revid:{id}@repo@org@cloud  --nototal | cm archive - --file=/external/archive

How can I archive all the revisions of the file '/arch.zip' file? Guess what?

Very easy too! Just find for all the revisions of that item and pass them to the 'cm archive' command as follows:

cm archive $(cm find "revs where itemid=$(cm ls /arch.zip --tree=br:/main@repo@org@cloud --format={itemid}) on repository 'repo@org@cloud'" --format=rev:revid:{id}@repo@org@cloud --nototal | paste -sd " " -) --file=/external/archive

How can I archive all the revisions except the last one loaded in br:/main?

It's exactly like the previous command but adding a condition to the find to skip the revision loaded in br:/main.

cm archive $(cm find "revs where itemid=$(cm ls /arch.zip --tree=br:/main@repo@org@cloud --format={itemid}) and id != $(cm ls /arch.zip --tree=br:/main@repo@org@cloud--format={revid}) on repository 'repo@org@cloud'" --nototal --format=rev:revid:{id}@repo@org@cloud | paste -sd " " -) --file=/external archive

The possibilities are infinite using find conditions with the ls command to resolve revision and item ids. The 'cm archive' command only needs a list of revisions that we can filter as we prefer.

All platforms - Web UI: Added alpha version to the logo

We added the "Alpha" label to the logo to show that WebUI is a pre-release early version.

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Added SSO login method names

We are getting ready to support new SSO login methods, in addition to the existing "Unity ID" and "Email". We are adapting the GUIs to render the actual method name in the SSO buttons:

Screenshot

All platforms - CLI: Undo operation from outside the workspace.

Added a new example to the cm undo command in the command-line help to let you know that you can specify an absolute path to undo the changes in any workspace:

cm undo c:\otherworkspace\file.txt

Server: Added configuration key for the webUI config files.

WebUI configuration files can now be placed on a different location through a setting placed in server.conf config file.

To set this custom path, add an entry to that file like the following below:

<WebUiConfigDir>/opt/plasticscm5/server/webuiconfig</WebUiConfigDir>

And copy there the webUI config files, such as webui.secret.conf, webui.tokens.conf, webui.userid.conf, and webui.users.conf

All platforms - CLI: Now you can specify tokens and cloud region configuration for every command

We added new global parameters to the CLI. They allow you to tune the configuration tokens and cloudregions files to use for command execution. So you don't need to have them configured on the machine. It's useful for integrations where there is no previous configuration.

The new parameters are:

* --tokenconf=[token_conf_path] - allows specifying the token file to use for the command execution.

* --cloudregionsconf=[cloud_region_conf_file] - allows specifying the cloudregion file to use for the command execution

Example execution:

cm repo ls --clientconf="C:\mysharedconf\client.conf" --tokensconf="C:\mysharedconf\tokens.conf" --cloudregionsconf="C:\mysharedconf\cloudregions.conf"

All platforms: Change password in User/Pass auth mode is now instant.

Prior to this version, changing user's password in User & Pass authentication mode required up to 5 mins to be updated in the server.

From now on, changing a password is immediate. If the password is changed in the server, just open the "Preferences" > "General" window in your Plastic SCM client and enter the new password.

REMARK: A credentials prompt could be shown in the Plastic SCM client under the following conditions:

* Your client is configured/connected to a server in User/Password mode.

* Your client has also a persistent server profile to connect to the same server.

* Then, your password is changed in the server.

This could happen because credentials of persistent profiles have preference over the client configuration. To avoid this prompt dialog showing up again and again, we encourage to enable the "Remember credentials as a connection profile" checkbox on that dialog, so the credentials of the stored profile are properly updated.

All platforms - Server: The warmup of a server under heavy load has been improved by x20 when using the UP authentication mode for groups.

This is valid when using the UP authentication mode or the mixed LDAP + UP groups mode (in both, the groups are read from the groups.conf file).

The bigger is the number of groups and users/groups inside these groups, the more noticeable is the performance improvement. The x20 improvement has been measured using 12000 group entries.

Linux - Proxy: the "plasticscm-proxy-server" is now the default proxy package, netcore-based.

We renamed the "plasticscm-proxy-server-netcore" to just "plasticscm-proxy-server", and we removed any plastic proxy compilation based on mono stack.

So, to install the proxy, use this package name from now on: "plasticscm-proxy-server".

REMARK: some distros (centos, opensuse, fedora) could require the removal of legacy "plasticscm-proxy-server-netcore" package before installing the new one. If so, please remove the "plasticscm-proxy-server-netcore" on your package manager before installing the new "plasticscm-proxy-server" (the legacy configuration is kept during the upgrade)

All platforms - Plastic: Triggers can now run from Global Config

One of the challenges when you need to run client-side triggers is to deploy them.

We have helped fix this problem by allowing triggers to be run from Global Config, which is a special repository that is deployed to all client workstations (or laptops :P). This way you just place your trigger in your Global Config repo, and every user will have it available.

To run the trigger, we introduced a new variable @GLOBAL_CONFIG_PATH, that will point to the global config directory of the server you're using.

So now you can create a trigger using a command like the following:

cm trigger create before-clientcheckin "Relative trigger path" "bash @GLOBAL_CONFIG_PATH/allrepos/triggers/trigger.sh"

You can learn more about triggers here: https://www.plasticscm.com/documentation/triggers/plastic-scm-version-control-triggers-guide

All platforms - CLI: Now you can specify working mode, user and password for every command

We added new global parameters to the CLI. They allow you to fine tune the credentials that will be used to run the command. Additionally, the command will be able to run without a client.conf file if you specify the working mode and credentials.

The new parameters are:

* --server=[server] - override the default server defined in client.conf

* --workingmode=[mode] - specify the working mode to use. Valid values are: nameworkingmode, adworkingmode, upworkingmode or ldapworkingmode.

* --username=[username] - specify the username to use in client connections. Required for 'upworkingmode' or 'ldapworkingmode'.

* --password=[password] - specify the password to use in client connections. Required for 'upworkingmode' or 'ldapworkingmode'.

Example execution:

cm repo list --server=guestOrganization@cloud \
  --workingmode=ldapworkingmode \
  --username=myuser@email.com \
  --password=mypassword

All platforms - Server: Security upgrade on LDAP user authentication mode.

We upgraded the LDAP authentication mode for security reasons.

After upgrading the server to this version, users running Plastic SCM client versions older than 9.0.16.4272 could show an informative window asking for an application restart of the Plastic SCM client.

After this restart, the client will automatically use the upgraded authentication mode.

Remark: The client might also prompt a credentials window to retype user's credentials.

All platforms - All clients: The clients are now more resilient over unstable networks.

We improved our method call retry mechanism. With these changes, the client can handle slow networks and connectivity loss in a more reliable way, reducing the number of times an operation gets abandoned because of issues when contacting the server.

All platforms - Web UI: Copy comment GUID

- Added a button to copy comment's GUID in clipboard

Linux: Added support to install Plastic SCM in Debian 11

Prior to this relase, installing Plastic SCM with the package manager failed due an unmet dependency to a third-party library (libicu). Now it is fixed, the dependency is met, and installing Plastic in Debian 11 is now possible.

Windows - Shell Extension: View History is now shown in folder background context menu

View history was visible when showing the context menu of a file or folder. Now it is also shown when displaying the context menu of a folder's empty space.

All platforms - Server: The 'showmethodlist' and 'htop' plasticd shell commands show more detailed information regarding trigger execution.

Now, when a server call enters the phase in which it runs a trigger, the status of the underlying connection will reflect so. This way, if the server is stuck running a trigger, you can easily debug it using the 'plasticd shell' debug tool.

You can see an example here: I created a before-mkbranch trigger that got stuck! Using the plasticd shell command I could connect to my server. Then I run showmethodlist and I could see that the method call was in Status=Trigger

localhost:8087> showmethodlist

ACTIVE METHOD CALLS
Name                                      Request IP              Time      Thread   Status   Protocol  Sec  User
CreateBranch                                    9 127.0.0.1       00:00:03  21       Trigger  Plastic   None sluisp
Total calls: 1
0 requests enqueued. 1 worker threads (0 free)

All platforms - Server: Configurable timeout for server-side triggers.

A timeout can now be set for server-side triggers (it is set to 2 minutes by default).

You can change the timeout by adding this to the server.conf config file:

<TriggerProcessTimeoutSeconds>120</TriggerProcessTimeoutSeconds>

Or entirely disable the timeout:

<TriggerProcessTimeoutSeconds>-1</TriggerProcessTimeoutSeconds>

All platforms - Plastic: Use relative date in the default changesets query

When using a custom query in the changesets view to filter the results, by default we were using a query like the following:

find changesets where date > '8/21/2021'

This is a fixed date, that will not automatically change on future queries.

We changed this to a relative query, that will produce different results depending on when it's executed:

find changesets where date > '1 months ago'

To see the updated default query you may need to delete your queries.conf file in your Plastic config folder

All platforms - Web UI: Code reviews improvements

- Added changesets select box to the changed files panel for easier changeset selection.

- Removed the whole branch switch from the changesets panel since it was redundant.

- Added badges for comments and conversations to easily spot how many are present.

All Platforms - GitSync: Added LFS support for GitLab & Bitbucket when pushing changes over SSH.

LFS was previously supported for GitLab & Bitbucket over https. However, the push operation (pushing changes from Plastic to Git) failed over SSH. Fixed.

All platforms - Web UI: File history improvements:

We removed the previous branch/label filter since it doesn't work correctly with the context of the history list and implemented individual filters for branches and types instead. We also added a button to go back to the file and individual download buttons for each entry in the history.

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Dockerfiles considered as txt files

Before this change, we were considering Dockerfiles as binary files by default, and users had to manually add the following line in filetypes.conf to consider them as text files:

Dockerfile:txt

Now they are considered as text by default

All platforms - Server: User reload users and groups time configurable

The server reloads the needed users and groups from the authentication provider every 5 minutes.

Now you can configure this time on the server.conf. Adding the setting "ReloadUsersRefreshTimeSpan" with the refresh time on the following format [d.]hh:mm:ss.

For example, if you want to do the refresh every hour, you should add the following to the server.conf.

  <ReloadUsersRefreshTimeSpan>01:00:00</ReloadUsersRefreshTimeSpan>

Linux - Command line client: All the Linux client packages will now bundle a netcore-compiled command line client!

From now on, the command line client ("cm") will be a netcore-based application, replacing the mono-based command line client, that had several stability glitches, it lacked some features (latest SSL protocols) ... but now we use the netcore-based "cm" application compiled to target Linux-x64 archs specifically.

Enjoy!

Find below some performance improvements:

A) Update operation test: Workspace of 110K items sizing 545MB. Instance: CentOS 7 rackspace instance of 15GB I/O v1

Time downloading the full workspace ('cm update' operation) with version 10.0.16.6001 (cm mono): 310s

Time downloading the full workspace ('cm update' operation) with version 10.0.16.6023 (cm mono): 256s (21% faster)

B) Checkout test: Workspace of 16K items, 137MB

Time performing a checkout recursive operation on the full workspace with version 10.0.16.6001 (cm mono): 5.4s

Time performing a checkout recursive operation on the full workspace with version 10.0.16.6023 (cm netcore): 3.2s (68% faster)

All Platforms - Cloud Server: Fixed an error that sometimes caused the server to fail when trying to use Google storage blobs

There was a race condition present when setting authorization headers that would sometimes cause an error alike to "Error getting data of ... - Value cannot be null." This should no longer happen.

All platforms - Web UI: Code review conversations

- Added a new feature for users to create code review conversations, they are different from comments since they are not tied to a specific file change and their purpose is to shed light into the purpose of the whole code review.

Screenshot

All platforms - GitSync: It now supports LFS when syncing from Github Enterprise servers, GitLab and Bitbucket!

Before this, it only supported GitHub (cloud).

No extra configuration is needed to take advantage of this. Just try it!

All Platforms - Server: Fixed the server command line option --websocketport to use the right port.

Also, the websocket port is only started when the configuration setting EnableDevOps (located in server.conf) is enabled.

All platforms - Server: Fixed exception not allowing to leave TCP port unset while having a SSL port set

All Platforms - Server: Saving organizations.conf is now written out atomically

All platforms - Web UI: Authentication token was moved to sessionStorage

This change was done to allow users to log in to multiple organizations at the same time in the same browser.

The authentication token will be stored until the user closes the browser tab.

Opening WebUI in a new tab will require the user to authenticate again.

All Platforms - Server: Replicating a repository using "cm clone" will no longer fail if that repository has shelves

All platforms - Web UI: Global Code Review comments

- Added the ability to add comments for the entire code review

- Updated the comments list to reflect which comment is assigned to a file and which one is assigned to the whole code review

- Enabled the comments panel even if there are no comments available

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: 404 Not Found page

- Updated the 404 Not Found page look & feel

- Updated various views to redirect to the 404 Not Found page if the resource doesn't exist

Screenshot

macOS - Plastic: Editing changesets to retroactively link to a code review will now mark the change requests referenced as done

For example, lets say you are fixing issues from a code review. You solve the problem brought up in the change request b78993b but forget to include it in your comment when checking in the changes:

Fixed the issue

To fix this, you can edit the comment in the properties panel, comparison view or via the command line to add the correct annotation:

[apply-change:b78993b] Fixed the issue

Previously this would do nothing but now it will mark the change request as done.

Windows - Plasticfs: Enabled mounting plasticfs workspaces under network share paths

Sometimes running commands under a plasticfs mount can fail with the message 'The volume does not contain a recognized file system.' This is because plasticfs by default do not use the Windows Mount Manager. In order to work around this it's now possible to create workspaces with network paths such as '\\workspace\path' (or any other path in the form ' \\____\____') which will use the Windows Mount Manager and therefore doesn't have this problem.

For example, lets say you have a repository called 'Test Repo' that you want to run a python script in but keep encountering an error similar to the one above. To work around this you can create a new workspace for 'Test Repo' with the path '\\test\repo' that will work for running your python script in.

Creating the workspace in this way has these minor usage issues:

* The 'Open in Windows Explorer' menu option (in Plastic & Gluon) doesn't open the selected folder/file. It just opens a new Windows Explorer window.

* The thumbnail preview doesn't work in Gluon.

* The workspace cannot be moved (using the 'cm workspace move' command).

All platforms - All clients: Wake On Lan support added to clients.

If your personal server runs on a different computer and it goes to sleep but supports WOL, the Plastic clients will send a magic Wake On Lan packet to try to wake it up.

We added support for Linux, Windows and macOS, but the feature is still kinda experimental, so do not hesitate to contact us with suggestions.

macOS - Command line client: .NET Core 'cm' is here!

All the macOS installers will now bundle a netcore-compiled command line client!

From now on, the command line client ("cm") will be a netcore-based application, replacing the mono-based command line client, that had several stability glitches, it lacked of some features (latest SSL protocols)... but now we use the netcore-based "cm" application compiled to target macOS specifically.

Enjoy!

IMPORTANT REMARKS:

1- This new CLI client doesn't support issue tracker extensions yet. If you're using them, you might detect that checkins aren't logged in the configured issue tracker. We'll add support for that feature again in the future.

2- The cm sync git feature is not yet available, due to a compatibility issue with native libraries and this new compilation of "cm" in .NET Core. We will enable this feature really soon (next release). So, if you're using this feature in macOS, we recommend NOT TO UPGRADE to this version.

Windows - Plastic: Editing changesets to retroactively link to a code review will now mark the change requests referenced as done.

For example, let's say you are fixing issues from a code review. You solve the problem brought up in the change request b78993b but forget to include it in your comment when checking in the changes:

Fixed the issue

To fix this, you can edit the comment in the properties panel, comparison view or via the command line to add the correct annotation:

[apply-change:b78993b]  Fixed the issue 

Previously this would do nothing but now it will mark the change request as done.

Windows - Plastic: Added support for FoxPro syntax highlight.

Now Plastic SCM displays syntax coloring for .prg source code files in the Diff Viewer (Windows only).

All Platforms - Command line client: The command "cm changeset edit" now correctly handles GUIDs

Previously this command only worked with changeset numbers. It now works if you refer to a changeset by its GUID.

Example:

cm changeset edit "89095131-895d-4173-9440-ff9ef9b2538d@project@cloud" "Changing my commit message"

All platforms - Plastic: Improved explanation text for directory conflicts

We add the words "Yours" and "Theirs" to the source and destination of a merge conflict to make it really clear where each conflicting change is coming from.

All Platforms - Server: Added the 'authtoken' command for generating authentication tokens.

$ plasticd authtoken
NEW-KEY-GENERATED

This is useful if your Plastic SCM server is using LDAP or Active Directory authentication. In this case, we strongly encourage you to enable auth tokens for security reasons.

You can enable it by editing your server.conf and add the following key:

<LdapTokenPrivateKey>NEW-KEY-GENERATED</LdapTokenPrivateKey>

Where NEW-KEY-GENERATED will be actually the output of the 'plastic authtoken' command.

Windows - Gluon: switch to changeset

This change is part of a set of changes mainly aimed at improving the workflow for Artists working in Unreal, but it is available to all users.

Artists working in Unreal often run into problems because of the coupled nature of game engine code and assets. It is not clear to the Artist which changeset to work on, and if they choose incorrectly then checkins can overwrite game code.

We have added a menu option to the Changesets view that allows you to switch the workspace to a specified changeset. This allows Artists to ensure their entire workspace is consistent and in the correct changeset.

Here is where you'll find the new option:

Screenshot

Windows - Gluon: Custom actions for Changesets

You can now configure custom actions that can be launched from the Changesets view context menu.

This feature has been available in Plastic for some time, and now we've made it available to Gluon users too.

Check out this blog post about [https://blog.plasticscm.com/2017/12/introducing-plastic-scm-external-tools-actions.html configuring external tools].

* How to configure External Tools for changesets

Add a new configuration file 'externaltools.conf'.

It allows you to specify external applications and arguments to pass to them. This is the syntax:

changeset | <toolName> | <pathToExecutable> | <args>

- toolName: The name of the tool to be displayed in the context menu

- pathToExecutable: Absolute path to the targeted application

- args: The arguments to be passed to the targeted application. There are three currently supported placeholders: @object (replaced with the object name), @repository (replaced with the repository of the object) and @wkpath (replaced with the current workspace path). Please note that the replaced values might contain blank spaces, so they'll probably need to be surrounded with quotes.

Examples:

changeset | Label changeset | "C:/Program Files/PlasticSCM5/client/cm.exe" | label create lb:MyLabel cs:@object

This will create a menu item "Label changeset" under "External Tools" which applies the label "MyLabel" to the selected changeset.

It should look like this:

Screenshot

You can add multiple external tools - just add a line to the config file for each one.

All platforms - Client and server: Improved Active Directory security and performance

Now companies using Active Directory with Plastic server and clients running on Windows will benefit from extra performance (token based security) and security (we now use the underlying Negotiate protocol).

To take advantage of it:

* Upgrade clients and servers to this version.

* Set LdapTokenPrivateKey in server.conf. Check how to configure this value with support.

All platforms - Web UI: Image display

- Enabled image visualization on all pages;

- Removed the size limit for images on File explorer;

- Zooming is not currently supported but will be added in the future.

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: File history UI update

- Consolidated the look & feel of the file history page.

- Extended the capabilities of search and filtering.

Screenshot

All platforms - CLI: Undo operation from outside the workspace

The undo operation of the Plastic CLI could only be performed from inside the workspace where the changes were to be applied. We changed this behavior, and now you can specify an absolute path to undo the changes in any workspace.

All platforms - Web UI: Individual views UI refresh

- Consolidated the look & feel of the branch, changeset & label details.

Branch details

Screenshot

Changeset details

Screenshot

Label details

Screenshot

All platforms - CLI: Add SSO working mode in clconfigureclient

Now you can configure your Plastic client from the command line using SSO. You need to specify the user, server, and SSO token. Like this:

clconfigureclient --language=en --workingmode=SSOWorkingMode --user=alvaro.berruezo@unity3d.com --server=codice@cloud --token=YOUR_TOKEN

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Makefiles considered as txt files

Before this change, we were considering Makefiles as binary files by default, and users had to manually add the following lines in filetypes.conf to consider them as text files:

Makefile:txt

makefile:txt

Now they are considered as text by default

Windows - Visual Studio Plugin: The plugin doesn't modify the .csproj anymore

Our VS plugin used to write some properties in the project file (.csproj) to know whether the project is under Plastic version control.

Now, the plugin will automatically detect whether you're using Plastic as Source control directly, without any need to use those properties.

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon, Command line client: Checkin operation performance improved: 2x faster!

We tweaked the default thread pools the checkin operation uses to upload data to the plastic server.

With these new default settings, we expect the checkin operation to be 2x faster than older default settings (since we doubled these default thread pool values).

We used the following setup to compare the old default values:

* Hardware: bare Intel Xeon E5 1620 @3.6GHZ, 8GB RAM, 8 cores, Windows 10

* Networking: 1gbps wired network

* Plastic workspace: 20000 files, 2000 directories, 1.25GB total workspace size

* checkin the whole workspace to a plastic cloud repository by using command line:

cm checkin c:/perf_workspace --timer --silent

Results:

* With old default settings, the checkin took 174 seconds.

* With new default settings, the checkin took 72 seconds (2.4x faster)

All platforms - Web UI: Branches list UI update

- Consolidated the look & feel of the branches list.

- Extended the capabilities of search and filtering.

Screenshot

All Platforms - Server: Fixed multiple repositories with same name in concurrency scenarios.

If users attempted to create repositories with the same name at exactly the same time, sometimes the system would allow it. This has been fixed so you can no longer have duplicate repositories.

All platforms - Web UI: Labels list UI update

- Consolidated the look & feel of the labels list.

- Extended the capabilities of search and filtering.

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: Changesets list UI update

- Consolidated the look & feel of the changesets list.

- Extended the capabilities of search and filtering.

Screenshot

Windows - Plastic: Auto-update!

Now you can update Plastic on Windows to the latest version from within the application itself.

When Plastic detects that a new version is available, the help panel will display a notification telling you which version is available. On the help panel is a link to download the latest version.

Here is the new version notification:

Screenshot

Simply click the link to download the update. You'll see progress in the notification bar at the bottom of the screen.

Downloading:

Screenshot

Once downloaded, you can click the button in the notification bar to launch the updater and restart Plastic.

Restart & upgrade:

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: File annotations

Added support for file annotations (blame).

Screenshot

Windows - Visual Studio Plugin: The plugin doesn't modify the .sln anymore

Our VS plugin used to write some properties in the solution file (.sln) to know whether the solution has Plastic configured as version control.

Now, the plugin will automatically detect whether you're using Plastic as Source control directly, without any need to use those properties.

All platforms - All GUIs: Improvements to Korean translations

We changed the translations of attribute and property based on user feedback. Thanks!

All platforms - All clients: The workspace tree (plastic.wktree) file format has been changed to read/save it in a much faster way!

We have tested the new format with different workspace sizes (with 80000 and 400000 files/directories) and in different machines. The improvements are the following:

* The time reading the tree is x2, x4 or even x10 times faster (depending on the machine tested).

* The time writing the tree is almost x2 times faster on average.

Some examples:

* Reading an workspace tree of 77000 items took 490 ms. Now, it takes 109 ms.

* Writing an workspace tree of 77000 items took 142 ms. Now, it takes 79 ms.

By default, the old format will still use. You can enable this format by adding the following setting on your client.conf. But this new format is not compatible with the Unity plugin yet. So, if you are a Unity user, please don't do it.

<EnableNewWorkspaceTreeFormat>yes</EnableNewWorkspaceTreeFormat>

This format was originally published in release 10.0.16.5574 but we unpublish it because of the Unity plugin incompatibility.

If you don't enable the new format, this version will revert the workspace tree to the previous format. This will allow you to use the workspace with the Unity plugin again.

Some extra background about the file: The workspace tree metadata is stored in the plastic.wtree file inside the workspace metadata folder (wks/.plastic). This file is read every time use a workspace in the GUIs for first time or when running a cm command for a workspace. It is written every time we do a changes in the workspace (switch to a different branch/changeset, run an update, do a checkout, undo some changes, etc). Its size depends on the number of items loaded in the workspace, so for big workspaces the time reading (or saving it) can affect to the performance of the clients.

All platforms - Web UI: File Explorer README.md support

Added support for README files in the File Explorer.

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: Various improvements

- If there are assigned code reviews, when visiting the code review list for the first time, it shows the assigned reviews, otherwise, it shows all reviews.

- Avoiding resetting data when navigating from one list to another.

- Lowered the minimum loading transition animation

All platforms - TeamCity plugin: Versioned settings is now supported!

We extended our plugin to support the Versioned settings feature in TeamCity. You can now enable it in any TeamCity project that consumes a Plastic SCM VCS root.

More info about Versioned Settings here.

Plastic Triggers: Wildcard support in repository filtering.

Triggers can now use wildcards to their repository filters, so they apply to either a single repository or a selected group of them.

Now, when you add a repository filter to your trigger, you can specify the exact repository name or use * as a wildcard. This would affect multiple repositories that share part of the name.

Examples:

* For all your repositories rep:*

* For your website_intranet repository rep:website_intranet

* For all your website repositories rep:website*

Try more! rep:*web* o rep:*intranet...

More info about Plastic triggers https://www.plasticscm.com/documentation/triggers/plastic-scm-version-control-triggers-guide

All platforms - All clients: The workspace tree (plastic.wktree) file format has changed to read & save it much faster!

We tested the new format with different workspace sizes (with 80000 and 400000 files/directories) in different machines:

* The time reading the workspace tree metadata is 2x, 4x or even 10x times faster than previous release.

* The average time writing the workspace tree metadata is up to 2x times faster than previous release.

Some examples:

* Reading a workspace tree of 77000 items took 490 ms. Now it takes 109 ms.

* Writing a workspace tree of 77000 items took 142 ms. Now it takes 79 ms.

Some extra background about the plastic.wktree file: The workspace tree metadata is stored in the plastic.wktree file inside the workspace metadata folder ($YOUR_WORKSPACE/.plastic).

This file is read every time a desktop application (Plastic, Gluon) opens a workspace for first time, or when running a command line operation for a workspace.

It is written every time we perform any change to the workspace (switch to a different branch/changeset/label, run an 'update workspace', checkout a file, undo pending changes, etc.).

Its size depends on the number of items loaded in the workspace. So, for big workspaces, the time reading (or saving) it can affect to the performance of the clients.

All platforms - Web UI: File Explorer README.md support

Added support for README files in the File Explorer.

Screenshot

All platforms - Web UI: Various improvements

- If there are assigned code reviews, when visiting the code review list for the first time, it shows the assigned reviews, otherwise, it shows all reviews.

- Avoiding resetting data when navigating from one list to another.

- Lowered the minimum loading transition animation

All platforms - TeamCity plugin: Versioned settings is now supported!

We extended our plugin to support the Versioned settings feature in TeamCity. You can now enable it in any TeamCity project that consumes a Plastic SCM VCS root.

More info about Versioned Settings here.

All platforms - Web UI: Loading states

All the new views like the repository list, file explorer and code review have new loading states to avoid displaying wrong states before the content is loaded.

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All Platforms - Plastic: confirm deletion messages for labels and branches have been improved!

Now when trying to delete one or multiple labels/branches from both the Branch Explorer and the Labels/Branches View, a more specific message about what you are about to delete is shown.

Check the following screenshots for labels:

Windows

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macOS

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Linux

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And screenshot for branches:

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Deletion message for code reviews was also improved:

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All platforms - Command line client: encoding set to UFT-8

We now automatically set the console input and output encoding to UTF-8 so that East Asian languages can be displayed correctly. Note: you must select a font containing glyphs for your language for the output to display correctly.

All platforms - Server: The max number of worker threads is now limited to MaxWorkerThreads * 10.

This value can be defined in the server.conf file.

<MaxWorkerThreads>64</MaxWorkerThreads>

The default value used is the number of processors * 4 (when the value is not defined in the server.conf).

All platforms - Web UI: File explorer UI refresh

Refreshed the UI of the main File Explorer list. Individual file/history views will be refreshed in the next update.

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All platforms - Web UI: File Explorer updates

On the roadmap to unify the design we updated the following in the File Explorer section:

- Updated the File View design and fixed page double scroll

- Tweaked the File History design, a full update is pending

- Set the file name as the default ordering for the File list, folders and xlinks are grouped and take priority

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All platforms - Web UI: Code review list redesign

We've just launched the redesign of the code review list and we are working hard towards refreshing all the other pages soon!

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All platforms - Web UI: Breadcrumb navigation

- Added repositories top menu item & removed the link from the logo

- Added breadcrumb navigation to Code reviews section and File explorer

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macOS - Plastic, Gluon: plastic links now functional!

Plastic Links are a great way to share content from your plastic repositories with your colleagues. You can easily share diffs, links to files and links to code reviews using Plastic Links. This feature first came to Windows, and is now available on mac!

* What is a plastic link? A plastic link is a URL that looks something like:

plastic://myorg.cloud/repos/toolsrepo/changesets/50/diff

* How do I open it?

Just click on the link in the normal way and Plastic or Gluon will launch (if not already running) automatically and show you the content specified in the link.

* How do I create a link to share with my colleagues?

From within Plastic you can share diffs from any diff view by clicking on the Plastic Link icon in the top right corner. This copies the link into your clipboard, ready to paste into a message.

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You can also share links to code reviews.

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From Gluon you can get links to controlled content by clicking the Plastic Link icon in the file properties panel.

All platforms - Plastic, Unity Plugin: Changed the Privacy statement text for Plastic to reflect Unity's privacy statement.

All platforms - Plastic, Unity Plugin: Added the "Turn off Plastic SCM" feature, with which you can disconnect your project from version control.

macOS - Plastic, Gluon: SSO credentials dialog now is cancellable

When you are trying to perform an operation on a cloud server and are not authenticated, the credentials are asked through a modal dialog. This dialog was not cancellable, so if you wanted to return to the application you had to enter some credentials.

Now we added the possibility to close this dialog by pressing the Escape key.

Windows - Server: All the windows installers will now bundle a netcore-compiled plastic server!

We moved all windows installers to netcore flavor on the server side. This is a step forward on move all our products to .Net Core stack on all supported OS, for the sake of stability, security and performance.

Remarks:

* SQL-based backends support will end up with netcore installers. Just super-fast 'Plastic Jet' backend will be the way to go.

* The installer & binaries size of netcore server increased compared to net framework server, but we will address this soon.

All platforms - Cloud Server: Reduced the number super-slow downloads (> 10s) from cloud regions.

The cloud servers use a local cache to reuse the data downloaded from the blob storage.

The process of calculating the data to clean from this cache was very slow. So, this could hit the performance of the calls that downloaded data from the cloud servers (update, merge, diff, etc) while this calculation was completed.

This time was greatly optimized from 30 s to 0.2 s, so client calls are not hit anymore by this calculation.

It only affected to the EU West & US East regions (since they are the ones with biggest usage) around 6-8 times per day.

All platform - Server: Improve calculate merge performance

We greatly improve the time to calculate a merge that involves several deleted files on both contributors. For example, we reduce from 273s to 1.5s the time to calculate a reported merge case with over 50 thousand deleted files on both contributors.

The incoming changes also takes advantage of this improvement.

All platforms - Server: potential deadlock on git server feature fixed.

The plastic server is able to act as a git server (More info here).

It could happen that performing a [console]git push[/console] on a repo previously cloned from a plastic server acting as a git server to get stuck. Now it's fixed.

All platforms - Eclipse: Cannot create label in a cloud org repo.

The eclipse plugin is throwing an Invalid changeset spec error when creating a new label in the "Labels" view. This only happens when the server is a cloud server. Example: myrep@awesomeOrg@cloud.

Now it's fixed.

Linux - GitServer: potential deadlock on git clone using http basic auth fixed.

We detected in some distros that using git server feature with http protocol and basic auth enabled on netcore server could cause a potential deadlock issuing a git clone from a plastic repo. Now it's fixed.

Example of the command that got stuck:

git clone http://user:pass@plastic_server:5555/my_repo  /home/user/git/my_repo

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Plastic 10 About image

To celebrate version 10 of Plastic, we updated the About dialog with a new design. Check it out:

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All platforms - Web UI: Code Reviews overall performance fixes.

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Use the same SSO credentials for different organizations

If you use the same credentials for more than one organization, now you just need to sign in to one of them. When trying to access the other organizations, Plastic will try to reuse the already existing credentials, so you don't need to authenticate again

All platforms - Web UI: Repositories list redesign

We've just launched the redesign of repositories list.

We are still working and adding features on it, so, more to come in the following weeks.

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All platforms - Server: Improve calculate merge performance

We greatly improve the time to calculate a merge that involves several deleted files on both contributors. For example, we reduce from 273s to 1.5s the time to calculate a reported merge case with over 50 thousand deleted files on both contributors.

The incoming changes also takes advantage of this improvement.

All platforms - Server: potential deadlock on git server feature fixed.

The plastic server is able to act as a git server (More info here).

It could happen that performing a [console]git push[/console] on a repo previously cloned from a plastic server acting as a git server to get stuck. Now it's fixed.

All platforms - Eclipse: Cannot create label in a cloud org repo.

The eclipse plugin is throwing an Invalid changeset spec error when creating a new label in the "Labels" view. This only happens when the server is a cloud server. Example: myrep@awesomeOrg@cloud.

Now it's fixed.

Linux - GitServer: potential deadlock on git clone using http basic auth fixed.

We detected in some distros that using git server feature with http protocol and basic auth enabled on netcore server could cause a potential deadlock issuing a git clone from a plastic repo. Now it's fixed.

Example of the command that got stuck:

git clone http://user:pass@plastic_server:5555/my_repo  /home/user/git/my_repo

All platforms - Plastic, Gluon: Plastic 10 About image

To celebrate version 10 of Plastic, we updated the About dialog with a new design. Check it out:

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