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P4 Server Administration Documentation | 2026.1

# Example of cloning a remote

In the following example, we get a list of remotes from a shared server, clone from the shared server using one of those remotes, show the resulting remote in the personal server with the `p4 remotes` command, and then demonstrate that the path listed in the remote spec corresponds to the path passed to the clone command:

1. First, we query a shared server for a list of remotes:

       p4 -p perforce:1666 remotes
       bpendleton-dev  'To clone bpendleton's dev branch, use this remote spec. '
       h_dev localhost:1666 'Created by hmackiernan. '
       markm-remote2  'Created by markm. '
       mw-dvcs localhost:1666 '[dvcs] Map main server components.  Created by mwittenberg. '
       p4-client localhost:1666 'Created by cmclouth. '

2. Then we choose a remote and pass it to the clone command:

       p4 clone -p perforce:1666 -r markm-remote2
       Helix db files in '/Users/jschaffer/.p4root' will be created if missing...
       Helix Versioning Engine info:
       	Server initialized and ready to use.
       Remote origin saved.
       main

       Changes were successfully fetched.
       Remote origin saved.
       Server jschaffer-dvcs-1422657971 saved.

3. Next we run `p4 remotes` against the personal server to show that we now have a remote called "origin," which is the renamed remote we cloned from the shared server:

       p4 remotes
       origin perforce:1666 'Description '

4. Next, we write the contents of the remote we passed to `p4 clone` to standard output to show the depot paths it specified in the `DepotMap` field:

       p4 -p perforce:1666 remote -o markm-remote2
       # A Helix Remote Specification.
       #
       #  RemoteID:            The remote identifier.
       #  Address:             The P4PORT used by the shared server.
       #  Owner:               The user who created this remote.
       #  RemoteUser:          The user to use when connecting to the shared server.
       #  Options:             Remote options: [un]locked, [no]compress.
       #  Update:              The date this specification was last modified.
       #  Access:              The date of the last 'push/fetch' on this remote.
       #  Description:         A short description of the shared server (optional).
       #  LastFetch:           The last changelist that was fetched.
       #  LastPush:            The last changelist that was pushed.
       #  DepotMap:            Lines to map local files to remote files.
       #  ArchiveLimits:       Limits on the number of files fetched (optional).

       RemoteID:       markm-remote2

       Owner:  markm

       Options:        unlocked compress

       Update: 2014/12/11 11:15:15

       Description:
               Created by markm.

       LastFetch:      default

       LastPush:       default

       DepotMap:
               //depot/main/p4/msgs/... //depot/main/p4/msgs/...

5. Finally, we write the contents of the origin remote spec to standard out to demonstrate that the depot paths it specifies in the `DepotMap` field are identical to those of `markm-remote2`:

       p4 remote -o origin
       # A Helix Remote Specification.
       #
       #  RemoteID:    The remote identifier.
       #  Address:     The P4PORT used by the shared server.
       #  Owner:       The user who created this remote.
       #  Options:     Remote options: [un]locked, [no]compress.
       #  Update:      The date this specification was last modified.
       #  Access:      The date of the last 'push/fetch' on this remote.
       #  Description: A short description of the shared server (optional).
       #  LastFetch:   The last changelist that was fetched.
       #  LastPush:    The last changelist that was pushed.
       #  DepotMap:    Lines to map local files to remote files.

       RemoteID:     origin

       Address:      perforce:1666

       Owner:  jschaffer

       Options:      unlocked nocompress

       Update: 2015/01/30 14:46:51

       Description:
               Description

       LastFetch:    996270

       LastPush:     4024

       DepotMap:
               //depot/main/p4/msgs/... //depot/main/p4/msgs/...

   Notice that the `LastFetch` and `LastPush` values have changed to non-zero numbers to reflect the highest changelist numbers most recently fetched and pushed.

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