Home » Archived » EPF » OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)?
| OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21154] |
Thu, 12 October 2006 15:49  |
Eclipse User |
|
|
|
Originally posted by: sdunn.sonusnet.com
We're embarking on a pilot project that will use the EPF Composer to
author various engineering processes. One of the issues I need to resolve
up front is the authoring process itself. Obviously there needs to be a
submit-review-accept cycle and on the face of it this needn't be so
different from any process for policing source code submissions, however
the creation of IDs for process elements, and the structured form of the
underlying versioned artifacts will likely complicate the merging of
multiple submissions.
As the OpenUP maintainers must have dealt with multiple submissions from
various authors and the review, acceptance and merging of content into a
single branch, I'd appreciate understanding the OpenUP development process.
Do authors work in private branches? Can individual contributors work in
the same packages or is exclusive ownership assigned? If shared ownership,
how are merges of the XMI files effected (aside from very very carefully!)?
Related to the above, Subversion is our chosen repository so we need to
work with this. The document 'Using EPF Composer with a VCS' talks about
Clearcase and CVS. I can't imagine there would be any issues, but aside
from not having tighter integration into the EPF Composer are there any
known issues (or best practices) when using Subversion?
Thanks,
Scott.
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| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21171 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 13 October 2006 14:21  |
 jan masaryk
Messages: 50
Registered: July 2009 |
Member |
|
|
I'm not a OpenUP maintainer or even contributor, but we evaluate EPFC fo=
r =
the same purpose.
Actually we choose subversion as well and we are solving the same questi=
ons
therefore answers are welcome. :-)
These are resources which I found relevant:
- Using Eclipse Process Framework Composer with a Version Control System=
http://dev.eclipse.org/viewcvs/index.cgi/*checkout*/org.ecli pse.epf/docs=
/Using%20EPF%20with%20a%20Version%20Control%20System.htm?rev =3DHEAD&cvsr=
oot=3DTechnology_Project&content-type=3Dtext/html
- EPF_Method_Authoring library in EPF project CVS repository
- Plugin structure of OpenUP (actual OpenUP from CVS)
When I look inside "EPF_Method_Authoring" library (which is authoring =
process for OpenUP)
I can't find many things related to your question .... could response =
anybody from OpenUP team? :-)
Here are some of my comments to topic (comments are very welcome):
- don't import "*.lock, *.project" files inside any vcs repository
- I don't see any reason to split methodology into more libraries
- split methodology into plugins considering variability of methodology =
=
(for example in OpenUP -> intent, solution, management, collaboration) a=
nd =
carefully use reference to other plugins
- each plugin should has maintainer responsible for plugin consistence a=
nd =
delimited access rights for authoring (editing)
Has somebody any others ideas, resources or skills?
Btw. which eclipse plugin you are using? Subclipse or Subversive?
best regards,
jan
On Thu, 12 Oct 2006 17:49:48 +0200, Scott Dunn <sdunn@sonusnet.com> wrot=
e:
> We're embarking on a pilot project that will use the EPF Composer to =
> author various engineering processes. One of the issues I need to =
> resolve up front is the authoring process itself. Obviously there need=
s =
> to be a submit-review-accept cycle and on the face of it this needn't =
be =
> so different from any process for policing source code submissions, =
> however the creation of IDs for process elements, and the structured =
> form of the underlying versioned artifacts will likely complicate the =
=
> merging of multiple submissions.
>
> As the OpenUP maintainers must have dealt with multiple submissions fr=
om =
> various authors and the review, acceptance and merging of content into=
a =
> single branch, I'd appreciate understanding the OpenUP development =
> process.
> Do authors work in private branches? Can individual contributors work =
in =
> the same packages or is exclusive ownership assigned? If shared =
> ownership, how are merges of the XMI files effected (aside from very =
> very carefully!)?
>
> Related to the above, Subversion is our chosen repository so we need t=
o =
> work with this. The document 'Using EPF Composer with a VCS' talks abo=
ut =
> Clearcase and CVS. I can't imagine there would be any issues, but asid=
e =
> from not having tighter integration into the EPF Composer are there an=
y =
> known issues (or best practices) when using Subversion?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Scott.
>
|
|
|
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21187 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 13 October 2006 22:50 |
Ricardo Balduino
Messages: 191
Registered: July 2009 |
Senior Member |
|
|
Hi,
The OpenUP team uses CVS - that's the version control system used by Eclipse
organization for its projects. I'm not acquainted with the full capabilities
of Subversion, but I'd suspect it should be quite similar to CVS, except
there's no seamless integration with Eclipse shell as CVS has.
Now, our experience with CVS can help you understand that there are some
tricks. CVS does not actually lock a file when some one is editing it. In
EPF Composer, we use the "server notifications" feature (borrowed from
Eclipse), so when someone edits a file, CVS server knows that and warns
other users who try to edit the same file. Still, the user could go ahead
and edit the same file. Merging xmi files is painful (as EPFC at this time
does not provide visual merge), so EPF committers have a rule of thumb: we
avoid touching a file that someone eles is editing. That's a good practice.
Other tools, like ClearCase, for example, will lock the file, so another
user will not touch it until checked in. Safest, I think.
If you have multiple content developers working on the same library, they
should be able to work in parallel, as long as they work in separate
plug-ins. If they work in the same plug-in, it also should be OK, as long as
they work in different elements (roles, tasks, etc). Be aware though that
some information is put in common files, such as brief descriptions of
elements, which affects the plugin.xmi. Even working in different plug-ins,
there may be conflict if two people try to change configuration information,
for example, which affects library.xmi.
Please check "Using Eclipse Process Framework Composer with a Version
Control System", section 7 "ways to minimize file conflict" and appendix A
and B for a list of files that change based on your actions. That should
give you awareness of what to do (and not to do) to have people working
concurrently on the same library.
Cheers,
Ricardo Balduino.
"Scott Dunn" <sdunn@sonusnet.com> wrote in message
news:481d2e4fdd7142f2da808cf16036d610$1@www.eclipse.org...
> We're embarking on a pilot project that will use the EPF Composer to
> author various engineering processes. One of the issues I need to resolve
> up front is the authoring process itself. Obviously there needs to be a
> submit-review-accept cycle and on the face of it this needn't be so
> different from any process for policing source code submissions, however
> the creation of IDs for process elements, and the structured form of the
> underlying versioned artifacts will likely complicate the merging of
> multiple submissions.
>
> As the OpenUP maintainers must have dealt with multiple submissions from
> various authors and the review, acceptance and merging of content into a
> single branch, I'd appreciate understanding the OpenUP development
> process.
> Do authors work in private branches? Can individual contributors work in
> the same packages or is exclusive ownership assigned? If shared ownership,
> how are merges of the XMI files effected (aside from very very
> carefully!)?
>
> Related to the above, Subversion is our chosen repository so we need to
> work with this. The document 'Using EPF Composer with a VCS' talks about
> Clearcase and CVS. I can't imagine there would be any issues, but aside
> from not having tighter integration into the EPF Composer are there any
> known issues (or best practices) when using Subversion?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Scott.
>
>
|
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| |
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21219 is a reply to message #21203] |
Mon, 16 October 2006 06:51 |
| Eclipse User |
|
|
|
Originally posted by: alexander.pehm.gmx.at
CVS provides the important Watch/Edit functionality.
You can configure EPFC to automatically send an edit notification to your
CVS server when you start editing a file.
Remember, normally you do not edit a single .xmi file, caus even simple
actions like adding the "brief description" of a method-element affect
multiple files (in this case 2).
In this case the built-in CVS client will send edit notifications for
every file that is affected by your action.
If another user wants to edit one of the files that you are currently
working on, he will receive a warning.
That is useful when you want to avoid merging changes later (remember you
may have to merge changes in multiple files).
Subversion (or at least the Eclipse plugin "subclipse") does not provide a
similar functionality. The only possibility is to explicitly lock the
files that you are working on (manually).
regards
Alex
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| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21280 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 20 October 2006 05:22 |
Jim Ruehlin
Messages: 73
Registered: July 2009 |
Member |
|
|
Hi Scott,
Besides the good information in the other responses to your post, be
aware that merging EPFC files is not a good idea. While they're XMI
files, they're complex and can get internally reorganized without you
knowing it. Until there's a good compare/merge feature in EPFC your
safest course, by far, is to not do parallel development of individual
files.
This may lead to you having to manually merge content from time to time.
In other words, copy/paste text in EPFC. There are some warnings about
this in the EPF Plug-in Authoring Guidelines, but in a nutshell you want
to avoid copy/paste from MS Word. Word apparently adds lots of extra
HTML tags that EPFC doesn't like. It's safe to copy from Word, paste
into a text editor (like Notepad), then copy/paste from the text editor
to EPFC. Not very fun, but it's simple and safe. BTW, the Authoring
Guidelines provides a lot of information on writing effective content as
well as how to use EPFC.
I'm very interested to know how your authoring efforts are going,
particularly creating the actual content and extending OpenUP/Basic.
Please keep us informed of your progress and questions. And feel free to
contact me directly if you'd like.
Thanks,
Jim Ruehlin
EPF Committer
jruehlin@us.ibm.com
|
|
|
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #21669 is a reply to message #21280] |
Thu, 26 October 2006 22:02 |
| Eclipse User |
|
|
|
Originally posted by: sdunn.sonusnet.com
All the comments make a lot of sense. I was always loath to start messing
around at the XMI level anyway. Unfortunately this does mean that until
the library is 'primed' with some of our base content there could be a
significant amount of manual effort expended re-entering method content.
Hopefully a smart merge capability is on the roadmap as the lack of a
merge is, I think, going to slow the authoring process, particularly as
authors will be located in different timezones. It would also be
preferable if the merge facility could be revision control system agnostic.
Some general comments follow:
One of the major issues Im encountering is simply trying to explain the
concepts. For the most part, those with recent development experience get
it. However, many potential authors have been out of development for a
long time, or were never developers to start with, and theyre struggling
with the abstract terminology. The docs are really pretty good however, so
I'm not sure there's much more that you can do to reduce the learning
curve.
Stability I can author method content all day with no problems. Switch
to authoring processes however, and Im lucky if EPF stays up for more
than 10 minutes at a time. I have no idea what is causing it to crash and
I have been unable to identify a repeatable list of actions that will
result in a crash. I was going to enter a bug in bugzilla but EPF crashes
when modifying processes is not terribly insightful! If anyone wants the
hs_err_pid file I can post it.
Print format a few folks have asked for print copies of processes that
they could review offline. Publishing and then printing from a web browser
is not going to work. Any thoughts as to publishing the content as a
single page HTML, PDF or similar?
Non-s/w development processes has anyone used EPF to author processes
that are unrelated to software development? I was demonstrating it to our
internal 'Process & QA' manager who is responsible for all of our ISO
processes and he quickly realised that there was no real reason why he
couldnt use this tool to describe processes for other organizations
manufacturing, finance etc.
Scott.
|
|
| |
| ISO 9001 and issue-tracking (was Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion))? [message #21756 is a reply to message #21669] |
Fri, 27 October 2006 03:13 |
| Eclipse User |
|
|
|
Originally posted by: christopher.fuhrman.etsmtl.ca
Scott Dunn wrote:
> Non-s/w development processes - has anyone used EPF to author processes
> that are unrelated to software development? I was demonstrating it to
> our internal 'Process & QA' manager who is responsible for all of our
> ISO processes and he quickly realised that there was no real reason why
> he couldn't use this tool to describe processes for other organizations
> - manufacturing, finance etc.
I've worked at places where the ISO 9001 Quality manual was nothing more
than a static web site with links to PDF documents. EFP would surely be
more flexible, and if you can tie content to an issue-tracking system,
then it would be very interesting.
I've been away from ISO9001 activities for 5+ years now, but I wonder if
there are open-source issue-tracking systems adapted to ISO9001. A quick
Google didn't turn up anything obvious.
--
Prof. Christopher Fuhrman
Department of Software and IT Engineering
University of Quebec - École de technologie supérieure (ETS)
http://profs.logti.etsmtl.ca/cfuhrman/index.shtml?en
+1 (514) 396 8638
|
|
|
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #566811 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 13 October 2006 14:21 |
jan masaryk
Messages: 50
Registered: July 2009 |
Member |
|
|
I'm not a OpenUP maintainer or even contributor, but we evaluate EPFC fo=
r =
the same purpose.
Actually we choose subversion as well and we are solving the same questi=
ons
therefore answers are welcome. :-)
These are resources which I found relevant:
- Using Eclipse Process Framework Composer with a Version Control System=
http://dev.eclipse.org/viewcvs/index.cgi/*checkout*/org.ecli pse.epf/docs=
/Using%20EPF%20with%20a%20Version%20Control%20System.htm?rev =3DHEAD&cvsr=
oot=3DTechnology_Project&content-type=3Dtext/html
- EPF_Method_Authoring library in EPF project CVS repository
- Plugin structure of OpenUP (actual OpenUP from CVS)
When I look inside "EPF_Method_Authoring" library (which is authoring =
process for OpenUP)
I can't find many things related to your question .... could response =
anybody from OpenUP team? :-)
Here are some of my comments to topic (comments are very welcome):
- don't import "*.lock, *.project" files inside any vcs repository
- I don't see any reason to split methodology into more libraries
- split methodology into plugins considering variability of methodology =
=
(for example in OpenUP -> intent, solution, management, collaboration) a=
nd =
carefully use reference to other plugins
- each plugin should has maintainer responsible for plugin consistence a=
nd =
delimited access rights for authoring (editing)
Has somebody any others ideas, resources or skills?
Btw. which eclipse plugin you are using? Subclipse or Subversive?
best regards,
jan
On Thu, 12 Oct 2006 17:49:48 +0200, Scott Dunn <sdunn@sonusnet.com> wrot=
e:
> We're embarking on a pilot project that will use the EPF Composer to =
> author various engineering processes. One of the issues I need to =
> resolve up front is the authoring process itself. Obviously there need=
s =
> to be a submit-review-accept cycle and on the face of it this needn't =
be =
> so different from any process for policing source code submissions, =
> however the creation of IDs for process elements, and the structured =
> form of the underlying versioned artifacts will likely complicate the =
=
> merging of multiple submissions.
>
> As the OpenUP maintainers must have dealt with multiple submissions fr=
om =
> various authors and the review, acceptance and merging of content into=
a =
> single branch, I'd appreciate understanding the OpenUP development =
> process.
> Do authors work in private branches? Can individual contributors work =
in =
> the same packages or is exclusive ownership assigned? If shared =
> ownership, how are merges of the XMI files effected (aside from very =
> very carefully!)?
>
> Related to the above, Subversion is our chosen repository so we need t=
o =
> work with this. The document 'Using EPF Composer with a VCS' talks abo=
ut =
> Clearcase and CVS. I can't imagine there would be any issues, but asid=
e =
> from not having tighter integration into the EPF Composer are there an=
y =
> known issues (or best practices) when using Subversion?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Scott.
>
|
|
|
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #566835 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 13 October 2006 22:50 |
Ricardo Balduino
Messages: 191
Registered: July 2009 |
Senior Member |
|
|
Hi,
The OpenUP team uses CVS - that's the version control system used by Eclipse
organization for its projects. I'm not acquainted with the full capabilities
of Subversion, but I'd suspect it should be quite similar to CVS, except
there's no seamless integration with Eclipse shell as CVS has.
Now, our experience with CVS can help you understand that there are some
tricks. CVS does not actually lock a file when some one is editing it. In
EPF Composer, we use the "server notifications" feature (borrowed from
Eclipse), so when someone edits a file, CVS server knows that and warns
other users who try to edit the same file. Still, the user could go ahead
and edit the same file. Merging xmi files is painful (as EPFC at this time
does not provide visual merge), so EPF committers have a rule of thumb: we
avoid touching a file that someone eles is editing. That's a good practice.
Other tools, like ClearCase, for example, will lock the file, so another
user will not touch it until checked in. Safest, I think.
If you have multiple content developers working on the same library, they
should be able to work in parallel, as long as they work in separate
plug-ins. If they work in the same plug-in, it also should be OK, as long as
they work in different elements (roles, tasks, etc). Be aware though that
some information is put in common files, such as brief descriptions of
elements, which affects the plugin.xmi. Even working in different plug-ins,
there may be conflict if two people try to change configuration information,
for example, which affects library.xmi.
Please check "Using Eclipse Process Framework Composer with a Version
Control System", section 7 "ways to minimize file conflict" and appendix A
and B for a list of files that change based on your actions. That should
give you awareness of what to do (and not to do) to have people working
concurrently on the same library.
Cheers,
Ricardo Balduino.
"Scott Dunn" <sdunn@sonusnet.com> wrote in message
news:481d2e4fdd7142f2da808cf16036d610$1@www.eclipse.org...
> We're embarking on a pilot project that will use the EPF Composer to
> author various engineering processes. One of the issues I need to resolve
> up front is the authoring process itself. Obviously there needs to be a
> submit-review-accept cycle and on the face of it this needn't be so
> different from any process for policing source code submissions, however
> the creation of IDs for process elements, and the structured form of the
> underlying versioned artifacts will likely complicate the merging of
> multiple submissions.
>
> As the OpenUP maintainers must have dealt with multiple submissions from
> various authors and the review, acceptance and merging of content into a
> single branch, I'd appreciate understanding the OpenUP development
> process.
> Do authors work in private branches? Can individual contributors work in
> the same packages or is exclusive ownership assigned? If shared ownership,
> how are merges of the XMI files effected (aside from very very
> carefully!)?
>
> Related to the above, Subversion is our chosen repository so we need to
> work with this. The document 'Using EPF Composer with a VCS' talks about
> Clearcase and CVS. I can't imagine there would be any issues, but aside
> from not having tighter integration into the EPF Composer are there any
> known issues (or best practices) when using Subversion?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Scott.
>
>
|
|
| | |
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #566964 is a reply to message #21154] |
Fri, 20 October 2006 05:22 |
Jim Ruehlin
Messages: 73
Registered: July 2009 |
Member |
|
|
Hi Scott,
Besides the good information in the other responses to your post, be
aware that merging EPFC files is not a good idea. While they're XMI
files, they're complex and can get internally reorganized without you
knowing it. Until there's a good compare/merge feature in EPFC your
safest course, by far, is to not do parallel development of individual
files.
This may lead to you having to manually merge content from time to time.
In other words, copy/paste text in EPFC. There are some warnings about
this in the EPF Plug-in Authoring Guidelines, but in a nutshell you want
to avoid copy/paste from MS Word. Word apparently adds lots of extra
HTML tags that EPFC doesn't like. It's safe to copy from Word, paste
into a text editor (like Notepad), then copy/paste from the text editor
to EPFC. Not very fun, but it's simple and safe. BTW, the Authoring
Guidelines provides a lot of information on writing effective content as
well as how to use EPFC.
I'm very interested to know how your authoring efforts are going,
particularly creating the actual content and extending OpenUP/Basic.
Please keep us informed of your progress and questions. And feel free to
contact me directly if you'd like.
Thanks,
Jim Ruehlin
EPF Committer
jruehlin@us.ibm.com
|
|
|
| Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion)? [message #567086 is a reply to message #21280] |
Thu, 26 October 2006 22:02 |
Scott Dunn
Messages: 10
Registered: July 2009 |
Junior Member |
|
|
All the comments make a lot of sense. I was always loath to start messing
around at the XMI level anyway. Unfortunately this does mean that until
the library is 'primed' with some of our base content there could be a
significant amount of manual effort expended re-entering method content.
Hopefully a smart merge capability is on the roadmap as the lack of a
merge is, I think, going to slow the authoring process, particularly as
authors will be located in different timezones. It would also be
preferable if the merge facility could be revision control system agnostic.
Some general comments follow:
One of the major issues Im encountering is simply trying to explain the
concepts. For the most part, those with recent development experience get
it. However, many potential authors have been out of development for a
long time, or were never developers to start with, and theyre struggling
with the abstract terminology. The docs are really pretty good however, so
I'm not sure there's much more that you can do to reduce the learning
curve.
Stability I can author method content all day with no problems. Switch
to authoring processes however, and Im lucky if EPF stays up for more
than 10 minutes at a time. I have no idea what is causing it to crash and
I have been unable to identify a repeatable list of actions that will
result in a crash. I was going to enter a bug in bugzilla but EPF crashes
when modifying processes is not terribly insightful! If anyone wants the
hs_err_pid file I can post it.
Print format a few folks have asked for print copies of processes that
they could review offline. Publishing and then printing from a web browser
is not going to work. Any thoughts as to publishing the content as a
single page HTML, PDF or similar?
Non-s/w development processes has anyone used EPF to author processes
that are unrelated to software development? I was demonstrating it to our
internal 'Process & QA' manager who is responsible for all of our ISO
processes and he quickly realised that there was no real reason why he
couldnt use this tool to describe processes for other organizations
manufacturing, finance etc.
Scott.
|
|
| |
| ISO 9001 and issue-tracking (was Re: OpenUP - authoring/submission process (and Subversion))? [message #567137 is a reply to message #21669] |
Fri, 27 October 2006 03:13 |
| Eclipse User |
|
|
|
Originally posted by: christopher.fuhrman.etsmtl.ca
Scott Dunn wrote:
> Non-s/w development processes - has anyone used EPF to author processes
> that are unrelated to software development? I was demonstrating it to
> our internal 'Process & QA' manager who is responsible for all of our
> ISO processes and he quickly realised that there was no real reason why
> he couldn't use this tool to describe processes for other organizations
> - manufacturing, finance etc.
I've worked at places where the ISO 9001 Quality manual was nothing more
than a static web site with links to PDF documents. EFP would surely be
more flexible, and if you can tie content to an issue-tracking system,
then it would be very interesting.
I've been away from ISO9001 activities for 5+ years now, but I wonder if
there are open-source issue-tracking systems adapted to ISO9001. A quick
Google didn't turn up anything obvious.
--
Prof. Christopher Fuhrman
Department of Software and IT Engineering
University of Quebec - École de technologie supérieure (ETS)
http://profs.logti.etsmtl.ca/cfuhrman/index.shtml?en
+1 (514) 396 8638
|
|
|
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