About entering artifact instances

A project created in Project Tracker is a collection of instances of various artifact types. An artifact type can be a Defect, a Request for Enhancement, or any other basic element of a project. When you create a new instance of an artifact type, for example, a new Defect report, you supply information that your domain administrator and project owner have determined are important for that artifact type. For example, a Defect artifact type may require you to enter a description and the name of the customer who reported the defect. An artifact instance is also referred to as an artifact.

Each piece of information that you enter in an artifact is known as an attribute. Attributes are characteristics of artifacts. For example, when you enter a new Defect, a Description may be one attribute of the defect report and the Customer Name may be another attribute. Attributes may be used to check the database for duplicates.

When entering an artifact instance, keep in mind that the quality of the information that you enter is vital to a project's success. For example, the following may be appropriate guidelines for entering Defects:

1. Reproducible - Artifacts that cannot be duplicated should be marked invalid.
2. Specific - The more details you provide the easier it is for the engineer to identify the problem and solution.
3. Sequenced - Provide the steps to reproduce the problem. If other people cannot reproduce the problem, it may be marked as invalid or it may not be documented correctly.
4. Identify actual versus desired outcomes - Be clear as to what happened versus what should have happened.

Inappropriate example of a defect description:

"My browser crashed. I think I was on example.com. My computer uses Windows. I think that this is a really bad problem and you should fix it now. By the way, I don't like the icons. Nobody will use your software if you keep those ugly icons. Oh, and my grandmother's home page does not look right, either, it's all messed up. Good luck."

More appropriate example of a defect description:

"The system crashes when using an image link with the border=0 attribute. Steps to reproduce:

1. Go to example.com, using the 10.28.99 build on a Win NT 4.0 (Service Pack 5) system.

   The system crashes.

2. When I reboot into Linux and reproduce this problem using the 10.28.99 Linux build (IssueEntryP9), it again crashes each time upon drawing the banner at the top of the page.

Expected result: the system should not crash.

Obtained result: the system crashed.

Workaround: The system no longer crashes when I edit the index.html page and remove "border=0" attribute from the following image link:

<img src="http://example.com/images/topics/topicfoos.gif" width=34 height=44 border=0 alt="News">"

Entering an artifact

Each artifact type has a unique set of attributes. Your administrators may require you to provide some types of information and may allow you to leave other fields blank. Note that the more information you provide when entering an artifact, the easier you will make it for other people who must work with that artifact. In addition to filling out text entry fields, you can add information such as dependencies on other artifacts and file attachments such as screen shots, email messages, and so on.

You can create assocations between people and an artifact. For example, when entering a Defect, you may want to assign someone to be responsible for fixing the problem, and you may want several other people to be sent email notification whenever the artifact is modified.

After creating an artifact, you can run a search (also called a query) and change data, associate users with the artifact, and so on.

Note: When modifying an artifact, you can add, update, and delete users with one submit action. For example, if you have associated three users with an aritfact, you can remove the association for one user, change the association of the other two, and associate another user in one step from the Associate Users section of the Artifact Summary page.

To enter an artifact

1. Click the Projects tab.
2. Click the link for a project that uses Project Tracker.
3. Click Project Tracker > Enter Artifacts in the left navigation pane.
4. If the artifact has more than a few attributes, enter basic attribute information and click Next.
5. Enter additional information, such as a long description, fields to check in the data base for duplicate artifact entries, attachments, and so on.
6. Click Submit artifact.

NOTE:  You can show a description for each attribute to help guide you in creating the artifact. To show attribute descriptions click the Show button in the Attribute descriptions field on the Enter new page. Attribute descriptions will appear below the attribute field in the form.  Click the Hide botton to remove attribute descriptions.

To associate people with an artifact:

1. After submitting a new artifact instance, or after running a query that returns an artifact instance, on the Artifact Summary page, click the Personnel tab if you are using the tab view. NOTE: This tab may be selected by default.
2. Associate users with the artifact by peforming one of the following tasks:
   • If you know the Username you want to associate with the artifact, enter it in the association type field.
   • If you do not know the Username or want to select more than one user click the Browse users... button to see a list of available users. Once on the Personnel page you will need to build an assignee list and define the association for each assignee. To do this
     1. Select the users you want from the Users table by clicking the checkbox next to the username.
     2. Use the drop down box in the Association column to select an association type for each selected user.
     3. Click the Add selected to assignee list button.
     4. The selected users will appear in the Personnel table. At this point you can change the association type for each user in the table using the dropdown boxes in the Association column. If you choose to change an association, click the Update selected to save your changes. You can also use the Remove selected button to delete selected users from the Personnel table.
     5. Once you have added all the users you need to the Personnel table click the Done button.
3. Click Save changes.

To remove a user association from an artifact:

1. Select the artifact you wish to affect either through a query or by artifact id.
2. If it is not already selected, click the Personnel tab.
3. Scroll to the Users associated with artifact section.
4. Find the user or users you want to remove in the Users associated with artifact table and click the Remove checkbox in line with the name.
5. Enter an explanation for the change in the Reason field.
6. Click the Save changes button to finish your task.

Configuring dependencies among artifacts

Your ability to work with one artifact may depend on the resolution of other artifacts. For example, a defect may require closure of another defect before it can be closed. There are three levels of artifact dependencies within Project Tracker:

• Blocking - Blocking artifacts prevent the artifact being blocked, from being resolved. The blocking artifact must be addressed before the blocked artifact can be resolved.
• Duplicating - Sometimes duplicate artifacts may be entered and need to be tracked separately. Marking an artifact as a duplicate allows users to track efforts on both artifacts. Duplicates may be in different projects or the same project.
• Non-blocking - Marking artifacts as non-blocking dependencies also allows users to simultaneously track efforts on two or more artifacts.

To create dependencies among artifacts:

1. In a project that uses Project Tracker, click Project Tracker > Query artifacts in the left navigation pane.
2. Create and submit a query.
3. Click the link for an artifact instance returned on the query.
4. In the tab view, click the tab for Attributes/Dependencies/URLs. In the page view, scroll to the Dependencies section of the page.
5. Enter the ID of the artifact instance that you want to associate with this artifact.
6. In the Choose Dependency Type drop-down list, click the type of association that you want to create.
7. Click Save Changes.

To view dependencies for an artifact:

1. In a project that uses Project Tracker, click Project Tracker > Query artifacts in the left navigation pane.
2. Create and submit a query.
3. Click the link for an artifact instance returned on the query.
4. In the tab view, click the tab for Attributes/Dependencies/URLs. In the page view, scroll to the Dependencies section of the page.
5. In the tab or page view, click the View Dependency Summary link.

Attaching files to an artifact

You can enhance an artifact instance by including relevant documentation, screen shots, email threads, code, or any other supporting file.

A user can view attachments associated with artifacts in a web browser. How an attachment is rendered in the web browser is dependent upon the attachment type selected during the attachment creation process. You can select any of the attachment types found in the type list or you can have the application automatically detect the attachment type. Since the attachment is rendered based on the attachment type selected you must use a compatible attachment type. Using an incompatible attachment type may result in failure to view the attachment in a web browser. For example, if you save a .doc file as a .bmp type and then try to view the attachment a blank page will appear. Files with size equal to 0 are not compatible with Project Tracker. Attempting to attach an empty file will result in an error message.

To add a file attachment:

1. In a project that uses Project Tracker, click Project Tracker > Enter artifacts in the left navigation pane.
2. If duplication checking is activated in your project, complete the first page of the artifact entry form and click Next. If duplication checking is not activated, you can skip this step.
3. In the page view, scroll to the Add attachment section in the Enter new artifact form. In the tab view, click the tab for Attributes/Dependencies/URLs.
4. Enter a brief description of the attachment.
5. Click the Browse button and navigate to the file on your local system, or enter a path for the file and select an attachment type that matches your attachment from the drop down list.

   Note: Any spaces in the file name of the attachment are converted to underscores.

6. Click the Add attachment button.

Note: The maximum file size of the attachment in Project Tracker is 150 mb.

To replace an attachment:

1. In a project that uses Project Tracker, click Project Tracker > Query artifacts in the left navigation pane.
2. Find the artifact with the attachment you would like to fix.
3. Click the Attachments/Dependencies/URLs tab.
4. Locate the attachment you want to alter.
5. Right mouse-click on the attachment and save it to your local disk. At this time you may want to verify that the file was saved to your local disk before continuing.
6. Check the checkbox next to the attachment and click the Delete attachment button.
7. Once you have deleted the attachment you can reenter it on the same screen using the Add attachment functionality.

Opening an attachment file

While opening file attachments with extensions like DOC, XLS, PPT, and PPS; the files open differently in various browsers. When using Internet Exlporer, they open in the same window. But when using Mozilla and Netscape, the attachment file either opens in a new window or opens a dialog box requesting the user to click on the radio button titled Open With and Save to Disk option. The Open With option is further categorized into 'Open with default application' and 'Open with the application we specify'. On doing any of the above, two windows open up which display:

1. File attachment in a New Window appearing as a Local file.
2. The current window remains open with the same content.

Note: However, a new window remains open but blank (this however depends if you open the attachment in a new tab or window).

The behavior is different in various browsers. However the same works consistently for attachments with extensions like TXT, JPG and GIF. This is caused by the individual browser settings.

Handling Duplicates

If you have duplication checking active, Project Tracker will use a subset of attributes to check for possible duplicates in the database. If duplicates are found a report of similar artifacts will be presented with your artifact listed at the top. Review the artifacts listed to determine if an existing artifact covers the artifact you are entering. You can do a number of things at this point:

• Review individual artifacts by clicking on their ID. The full artifact description will appear.
• Alter one or more artifacts at the same time. Click on the check box to the left of the artifact IDs that you would like to manipulate. You can then enter a note in the note field and click the Submit note only button to add a note to the comments section of all artifacts selected.
• Skip this process by clicking on the Continue entry button.

Reviewing duplicates

For each item in the database that has been identified as a possible duplicate for the criteria you entered, an entry appears in the Identified as duplicate screen. You can change the sort order by clicking on the title of the column. Each column represents an attribute used in the search for duplicates.

Each project has a set of assigned attributes. The values entered for each of the attributes is parsed into a search string so that each value becomes a searchable string. Use this page to compare your potential new artifact with those in the database.

Commenting on like artifacts

The note box under the list of like artifacts allows you to add comments to artifacts without going to the artifact. You may want to comment that you are experiencing similar problems, recommend a solution for a similar artifact or add to the information in an attribute. Information entered in the box will be added to the Notes section in the artifact. To add comments, enter text in the Notes box and click the Add comment to selected button. Once your entry has been processed a message will appear at the top of the screen letting you know that your comment has been added.