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P4 Defect Tracking Gateway Documentation | 2025.1

# P4 DTG overview

P4, also referred to as P4 Server or P4 Server, includes a basic issue-tracking feature called jobs. A job can be associated with a changelist, so that, for example, when you check in the files that fix a bug or implement a new feature, the associated job is closed.

P4 Defect Tracking Gateway enables you to integrate P4 Server jobs with external defect trackers so that changes to the status of defect tracker issues are replicated in P4 Server jobs and vice versa. For example, when a programmer checks code into P4 Server, thereby fixing a job, the fix information can be replicated to your defect tracker to notify QA engineers that the fix is ready for testing. P4 DTG enables you to specify how data is propagated between the two systems and provides a program that replicates data according to your specification.

## plugins for defect trackers

The P4 DTG installer provides a directory named `plugins` that contains a subdirectory for each of the supported defect trackers. This Guide includes information for configuring the P4 DTG replication plugin for the supported defect trackers, Jira and Bugzilla.

The plugin controls which defect tracker data is made available for replication. To replicate data between P4 Server and defect trackers, map P4 Server job fields to defect tracker fields and specify how they are propagated.

After you install a plug-in, read the product-specific documentation:

- for Jira, that information is included in this guide at:

  - Installation prerequisite for Jira replication only

  - Jira Custom Fields

  - Example Jira implementation

- for Bugzilla, see `p4dtg/doc/bugz3mysql5/README.txt`

Defect replication is one-to-one, meaning that for each new defect, one P4 Server job is created. You cannot configure P4 DTG to map multiple jobs to a single defect, or multiple defects to a single job.

## Basic data flow

The flow of data between the defect tracker and P4 Server follows this sequence:

1. QA or Support engineer enters a defect into the defect tracker.
2. P4 DTG replicates the defect in P4 Server as a job.
3. A software engineer reads the P4 Server job and fixes the defect.
4. The software engineer attached the job to a changelist containing the fixed files and checks in the changelist, fixing the job in P4 Server.
5. P4 DTG replicates the fix from P4 Server to the defect tracker.
6. The QA or Support engineer sees the fix in the defect tracker.

## Detailed data flow

How data is replicated between your P4 Server and your defect tracking system:

The data stored for each job is defined by the P4 Server job specification, which can be modified by a user with administrative privileges. For details about modifying the job specification, see Customizing Helix server: job specifications in P4 Server Administration Documentation.

By default, P4 Server does not maintain a history of changes to jobs. However, you can create a spec depot in which all changes to P4 Server specifications are archived. For details see Spec depot in P4 Server Administration Documentation.

## Basic P4 DTG installation and configuration steps

To integrate your defect tracker with P4 Server, you must:

1. Install P4 DTG, see Install P4 DTG.
2. Read the P4 DTG replication planning section, see Plan your replication.
3. Add required fields to the P4 Server job specification, see Add required fields to the P4 Server job specification.
4. Optional: Add defect tracker custom fields to hold Perforce job data, see Add defect tracker custom fields to hold job data.
5. Configure P4 DTG, see Configure P4 DTG.
6. Configure and start the replication engine, see Configure and start the replication engine.

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