p4 status - misleading Perforce command name

So, I want to run a command in a script that asks Perforce if a file exists in the depot.



I wonder what such a command might be callewd. Let's try "p4 status".



Strange... google "p4 status".



!!!! "p4 status"  `Open files for add, delete, and/or edit in order to reconcile a workspace with changes made outside of Perforce.1

This is stupid.  In English, in 99.99% of programming systems, "status" is a read-only query.