git-p4: fatal: git was built without support for git-p4 (NO_PYTHON=1)

Question

I am trying to use git p4 on my Linux computer. But there seems to be a problem with git-p4 for some reason. When I run the git p4 command I get:

fatal: git was built without support for git-p4 (NO_PYTHON=1)

Any idea why this message is being displayed? Is there anyway I can fix it?

I am using an Ubuntu distribution with Kernel version 3.11.0.

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

You could download the git-p4.py file and move it to the right directory:

wget http://git.kernel.org/cgit/git/git.git/plain/git-p4.py?id=master -O git-p4 && chmod +x git-p4
sudo mv git-p4 /usr/lib/git-core/

Answer 2

You can just download the python script and install it somewhere, as described here:

https://git.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/GitP4#Adding_git-p4_to_an_existing_install

I found I had to put git-p4 into /usr/lib/git-core on my Ubuntu system for it to be invoked by git:

$ sudo mv /path/to/git-p4.py /usr/lib/git-core/git-p4

$ git p4 clone //depot/somebranch

(You need to remove the .py file extension).

Or you can just run it by hand (it's just a Python script and has no particular dependencies).

e.g.

$ /path/to/git-p4.py clone //depot/somebranch

The real problem is that the git-p4 Debian package has been removed because it depends on the non-free p4 client. See this bug report:

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=715534

So creating a non-free or contrib git-p4 debian package would fix this properly.

Answer 3

The version of git included with Ubuntu 14.04 is not compiled with python support. git-p4 is written in python. This version of git includes a shell script called git-p4 that gives you the message.

You can either:

• Uninstall the binary git package, and compile your own with python support.
• Get a copy of git-p4 (python) and put it in your $PATH, and delete the shell script git-p4.