# Connecting to the Perforce server

To connect to a Perforce server:

1. Choose Connection>Open Connection... The Open Connection dialog is displayed. If you have previously used the connection, select it from the Recent connections pulldown menu.
   Otherwise:
2. In the Connect to fields, enter the server name and port number for this connection. For details about specifying the Perforce server port, consult your Perforce administrator.
3. In the Connect as fields, enter your user name and password (if a password is configured for the user).

- To browse for a particular user, click the Browse button and select the user from that list.
- To create a user, click the New button and fill in the appropriate information.

4. (Optional) In the Open Workspace fields, specify the name of your client workspace.

- To browse for a particular client workspace, click the Browse button and select the workspace from that list.
- To create a client workspace, click the New button and fill in the required information.

5. Click OK.

P4V connects to the specified Perforce server and displays a new instance of its main window.

## Unicode mode servers

To configure a default encoding for Unicode servers, choose Tools>Preferences... and click the Connection tab. If you are connecting to a Unicode server for the first time, P4V displays the Choose Character Encoding dialog after you dismiss the Open Connection dialog. Specify the desired encoding and click OK. The encoding that you specify overrides any default that is configured, and the specified encoding is used when you subsequently connect to the same server.