Configuring Rational DOORS data for external applications

You can use the working set, attribute and link type mapping, and the reportable shape to configure IBM® Rational® DOORS® data for integration with external applications. These applications include Rational Engineering Lifecycle Management, Jazz® Reporting Service, and applications that are integrated with Rational DOORS by using OSLC.

About this task

Working set

The working set determines which Rational DOORS projects, folders, and modules are available for the following external applications:

  • TRS provides data to consumer applications that use the Lifecycle Query Engine (LQE) to build an index to visualize, analyze, and organize engineering data. The data can be collected from many tools. Rational Engineering Lifecycle Management uses LQE to consume Rational DOORS data.
  • The link discovery capability enables external applications that are integrated with Rational DOORS to discover OSLC links in Rational DOORS and make them visible in the external applications.
  • Jazz Reporting Service uses data that is extracted from Rational DOORS by the Data Collection Component and imported into a report data warehouse.

The working set is helpful for focusing on relevant data during analysis and reporting. Rational DOORS repositories can contain massive amounts of data. The working set eliminates processing of irrelevant projects, folders, and modules so that you can efficiently capture accurate business analytics. In addition, when irrelevant information is eliminated, the system performance improves.

Attribute and link type mapping

You can use Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) to create a consistent OSLC representation for attributes and link types with the same name and type across all modules that are available for integration with external applications. Attributes and link types that are used in multiple modules have unique identifiers in those modules, even if they have the same name and type. External applications treat these attributes and links as different types. This treatment prevents consistent querying and reporting across modules. Attribute and link type mapping assigns a single URI to attributes and link types that have the same name and type but that are in different modules. This mapping provides a consistent OSLC representation that enables external applications to recognize equivalent attributes and links across modules.

Attributes and link types that are used in multiple modules have unique identifiers in those modules, even if the attributes and link types have the same name and type. For example, if you create an integer attribute that is named ABC in a module, and then copy the module, the ABC attribute has a different ID in the new module. The IDs are unique to each module and difficult to read, as in this example of the two ABC attribute IDs:
http://myserver:8080/dwa/oslc/shapes/requirement/urn:telelogic::1-46dd5d7806b96973-M-00000666/attr-123
http://myserver:8080/dwa/oslc/shapes/requirement/urn:telelogic::1-46dd5d7806b96973-M-00000626/attr-327
Link types are also unique in each module. This unique identification of attributes and link types at the module level prevents consistent querying and reporting across modules in external applications. To avoid this problem, you can create common representations across modules by mapping attributes and link types to Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs). The URI is consistent and readable, which enhances query and analysis capabilities, as in this example of a common URI for the ABC integer attribute:
http://www.mycompanyname.org/rm/predicate#ABC_Integer
When attributes and link types are mapped to consistent URIs, external applications can recognize equivalent attributes and links across modules. To map attributes and link types to URIs:
  • The attribute names and types must be the same in each module.
  • A working set and reportable shape must be configured to make the modules, attributes, and link types available for integration with external applications.

Reportable shape

You can use the reportable shape to specify which attributes and link types are available for reporting in Jazz Reporting Service.