ForceCommander v1.0.0

ForceCommander is a two-panel file manager in the Total Commander tradition that understands a Perforce workspace. Half of the daily work with a workspace is not merging or branching but plain questions about files: what have I checked out, what is stale, who has this file, what is not in the depot at all. Here the answer is a column next to the file name, and the ordinary file operations go through Perforce on their own.

A file's state, in a column

The moment a panel steps into a workspace, the attributes make way for the revision, the state, the author and the changelist number. The Status column says it in one word: sync, old, edit, add, open: name, locked: name, local. Rows are coloured too: orange is yours, red is someone else's lock, blue means time to sync, yellow is not in the depot. Sorting by Status puts whatever needs attention at the top.

Perforce from the keyboard

Check Out (Ctrl+E), Revert, Revert if Unchanged, Get Latest, Mark for Add and Mark for Delete are in the menu, on the right click and on keys. Commands that do not apply to the selection are greyed out. Every Check Out opens a new changelist of its own, so the default changelist never becomes a pile nobody can sort out by evening. A file's history (Ctrl+H) and who has it open (Ctrl+O) are one key away.

File operations that go through Perforce

F5, F6, F8 and renaming inside a workspace go through p4: a copy is marked for add, a move becomes p4 move, a delete becomes p4 delete. Ctrl+Z takes back the last twenty operations, in plain folders and in a workspace alike, as long as nothing has been submitted.

Changelists you walk into like folders

At the end of the drive list sit pending and submitted. A changelist there is just a row: step into it, mark it, rename it, move files into it. The six changelists a day of Check Outs leaves behind merge into one in three steps.

Folders that keep themselves fresh

The three to five folders you always want at the latest revision - shared rigs, the level everyone builds into, the material library - go on a list, and the program keeps them there by itself: at start and then on a timer, quietly, one at a time. Files you have checked out are left alone.

Everything you expect from a file manager

Two panels with tabs, a Directory Menu of favourite folders (Ctrl+D), branch view with every file under a folder in one list (Ctrl+B), multi-rename with masks, search, a built-in viewer and editor, archives you step into like folders (zip by the program itself, 7z and rar with 7-Zip and WinRAR), and all of it without a mouse. Five colour schemes: a dark and a light one in the spirit of Total Commander, and three DOS ones - a homage to Norton Commander, Volkov Commander and Dos Navigator.

Open source

The program comes under the MIT licence, with its Python source and a batch file to build it. Everyone's Perforce setup is different; if yours needs something bent to fit, the code is there.

What it does not do

It submits nothing to the depot (apart from one in-between step in two special renames: changing the case of letters and swapping the names of two files), and it does not replace P4V: submitting, resolving, branching, integrations and workspace specs stay there, and Open in P4V takes you to the file. It never talks to the server itself - every command goes through the official p4.exe, with your settings and your login, and the program never sees your password. The author has no connection with Perforce Software, and this is not an official client.

At a glance

• System: Windows 10 and 11
• Needs: p4.exe (it comes with P4V); without it the program works as a plain file manager
• Installation: none, unpack and run
• Interface language: English; illustrated manual in English and Russian (F1)
• Licence: MIT, source code in the archive
• Archive size: 50 MB