Forced Perforce Saving with Vim

One of the awkward mechanics of Perforce is that all files in the local repository are marked read-only unless explicitly opened through p4 open. This can be especially irritating when Vim is already open and half a dozen changes have been made to the file. Lets create a Vim command to deal with this elegantly.

The following vimscript can go straight into your .vimrc file.

command! Fu call FU()

function! FU()
    silent !p4 open %
    execute "w!"
    execute "redraw!"
endfunction

This is more or less what one might type into Vim in order to remedy the situation manually with the exception of redraw! which was required for me to avoid graphical glitches.

Now our burden has been reduced to typing :Fu† in Vim and the file will be legitimately opened and saved.

† Fu may be an abbreviation of something. Use your imagination.