Cloning requirement artifacts

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Reorganize how artifacts are grouped in your project area by cloning them from one component into another. When you clone an artifact, a new version is added to the stream of the component that you work in.

Before you begin

  • A Requirements Management (RM) project administrator must set up the project area:
    • for the project area.
    • Import the component properties so that both components define the same properties, such as artifact types, artifact attributes, and link types.
  • To clone artifacts into a component's folder within the same project area that contains the component:
    • If the folder is owned by a project area, then you must be a project area administrator. If the folder is owned by a team area, then you must be a team area administrator.
    • You must have permission to create and deliver change sets.
  • To clone artifacts from a component in another project area:
    • You must be a member of that project area.
    • The project area must be enabled for configuration management.

About this task

Each configuration-enabled project area that you create contains an initial component. You can create other components to represent smaller logical or physical pieces of your project. Then, you can reorganize the artifacts across the components by either cloning or copying them. Starting in version 6.0.3, when you enable the project area for configuration management, you can create components and reorganize the artifacts from an earlier project version so that you don't have all the artifacts in one configuration.

For example, you have an Airplane project area in a previous version of IBM® Engineering Lifecycle Management. After you upgrade to a version later than 6.0.3, you might reorganize that project area into components such as Engine, Fuselage, Wing, Cockpit, and other components. Then, you can use the clone task to reorganize the artifacts into the new components.

When you clone an RM artifact, a new version is added to the stream that you work in, and that artifact now exists in two different configurations. You cannot add those configurations to the same global configuration.

Use the following table to help you decide whether to clone artifacts or copy them. For details about copying artifacts, see Copying artifacts between project areas, which also describes copying between components in RM configuration-enabled project areas.
Table 1. Comparing cloning and copying operations
Decision points Cloning Copying
Create a new version of the artifact (artifact URL stays the same) A check mark icon. A new artifact is created with a new URL.
Preserve artifact history A check mark icon.

The cloned artifact shows only the history that is related to its new configuration context. While that history includes a text entry (not a link) indicating the original component and configuration, you must manually go to that source version to access the history.

 A new artifact is created; no history to preserve.
Preserve outgoing links (RM owns only the links to other RM artifacts) A check mark icon.

If link validity is enabled, the link validity status of links from the cloned artifacts is set to Unknown. You must reset the link validity status; see the related topic.

 A check mark icon.

If link validity is enabled, the link validity status of links from the copied artifacts is set to Unknown. You must reset the link validity status; see the related topic.
Ability to view incoming links (links from downstream artifacts in other Engineering Lifecycle Management applications such as Quality Management (QM) and Change and Configuration Management (CCM) A check mark icon.

Incoming links to RM artifacts are not cloned because the downstream artifact (the one that originates the link) owns that link. However, because the artifact URL doesn't change when you clone the artifact, you can still see incoming links. They are visible when you work in a global configuration that contains both sides of the link - the configuration with the cloned artifacts and the configurations from other applications that link to them.

If link validity is enabled, the status of the link to requirement artifacts is set to Unknown. The system detects that the cloned artifact is a different version (even though the URL is the same) from the original artifact in the source component. You must reset the link validity status; see the related topic.

 Copied artifacts have a different URL. You must re-create links (and choose to reset the link validity status) to related artifacts in other Engineering Lifecycle Management applications.
Ability to work with artifacts in other project areas A check mark icon.

You can clone only across components and project areas that are enabled for configuration management.

 Both project areas must have the same setting: both are enabled, or both are disabled for configuration management.

Procedure

  1. Switch to the component and stream you want to clone artifacts into.
  2. Optional: Consider taking a baseline of the stream so that you can revert to it if you clone the wrong artifacts or the results are not what you expect.
  3. Create a change set and switch to it.
    Click Current Configuration > Create Change Set and complete the steps in the wizard. Your configuration switches to the new change set, or, if you are using global configurations, your personal stream. If you clone the wrong artifacts or the results are not what you expect, you can discard the change set and not affect the stream, but you must fix the component overlap information that the system has. See the related topic about fixing an overlap.
  4. On the Artifacts page, in the Folders view, right-click the folder to clone artifacts into and click Clone from a Component, and follow the steps in the wizard.
    Remember:
    • By default, all outgoing links from RM artifacts are also cloned. RM owns only links to other RM artifacts, so outgoing links only go to other RM artifacts. To disable the cloning of outgoing links, clear the Include Links option. You might disable this feature if you decide that existing links from the artifact are no longer relevant for your project area.
    • When you clone modules, the views from those modules are also cloned.

    If you later decide to clone the artifacts again to get the links, any changes you made to the artifacts in the target component are overwritten.

    When you select a folder, all its artifacts and subfolders are also selected for cloning, but you don't see them in the list. If you later add an artifact or subfolder that is already part of another folder in the list, the artifact is still cloned only once.

    For each artifact that you clone, a new version is added to the change set.
  5. Deliver the change set that you created in step 3.

Results

Items that are not included when you clone artifacts:
  • Links to the cloned artifacts from artifacts in other applications because the links are owned by the other artifact's application.

    Because cloning preserves the URL of the artifact, you can still see links to the cloned artifact when you work in a global configuration that includes the cloned artifacts and the artifacts that link to them.

  • Tags and comments
  • Reviews
  • Only the views that are specific to the module(s) being cloned will be cloned with them. All other views that are modules of this type or all modules will not be cloned. Those views can instead be copied if they are needed. To get these other views, you can create an empty module of the same type and then COPY it rather than clone. This copies all the views and then you can delete the empty module in both, the source and the target.

If later you must add the source and target configurations of the component to the same global configuration, see the related topic about fixing component overlap.

If you clone those artifacts again from the source component into your change set, your changes to them are overwritten.