Integrating Rational DOORS and Rational Quality Manager

Starting in Rational® DOORS® Version 9.4 and Rational Quality Manager Version 4.0, you can integrate Rational DOORS and Rational Quality Manager using the Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration (OSLC) specification. OSLC enables you to create bidirectional links between test and requirement artifacts and display rich hover text when viewing Rational DOORS requirements in test cases and Rational DOORS requirement collections in test plans. In Rational DOORS, you can also link from certain Rational DOORS objects, such as requirements, to test plans , test script steps, and test cases in Rational Quality Manager.
Note: This topic applies to IBM® Rational DOORS version 9.4 and later. For information about integration IBM Rational Quality Manager with Rational DOORS version 9.3 and earlier, see Rational DOORS for Rational Quality Manager Interface (DOORS 9.3) in the Rational DOORS documentation for versions 9.3 and 9.4.

Artifact linking when using OSLC

When you create a link to external artifacts in an application, a link is automatically created back to the source artifact in the target application, called a back link. When a link has been created from a source artifact to an external artifact and a resulting back link has been created from the external artifact to the source artifact, the links are referred to as bidirectional links.

The source and target applications store their links in separate databases, and the source application does not have access to the database in the target application. Certain transactional operations, such as when artifacts are copied or deleted, can occur in the source application server. In these cases, corresponding back links in artifacts in the target application are not automatically added or removed. There can also be instances where back links are intentionally removed in the target application without removing the corresponding link in the source application. As a result, if bidirectional links are not in a state of synchronization, traceability between the source and target artifacts can appear differently based upon your starting view point.

The accuracy of traceability reports could be affected if bidirectional links are not in a synchronized state. For example, a report run against artifacts in the target application might provide different results than a report run in the source application against the same artifacts. Links to the following artifacts are included in this limitation:
  • Requirement collections
  • Development plans
  • Requirements
  • Change requests, such as Defects, Tasks, Plan Items, and Stories
Important: A state of synchronization between bidirectional links and the traceability between source and target artifacts are not guaranteed.

Links to locked artifacts

If a requirement or requirement collection is locked in Rational DOORS when you attempt to create or delete a link to the artifact, you might receive a message that the changes to the link cannot be saved. When this happens, the Quality Management application prompts you to choose how to proceed. In the prompt, there are three options: Try again, Cancel, and Save partial changes. Option Try again attempts to create or delete the back link again. If the requirement or requirement collection is still locked, the operation will fail. Option Cancel cancels the change to the link on the test artifact and the back link on the Rational DOORS requirement or requirement collection. Option Save partial changes only changes the link on the Quality Management test artifact but does not change the link on Rational DOORS requirement or requirement collection. You must repair the link later in Rational DOORS for it to function correctly.

Enabling integration between applications

To enable communication between the applications, you must add the Rational Quality Manager server to the remote services list in Rational DOORS, and add the Rational DOORS in a "friend" relationship on the Rational Quality Manager server.

Note: To perform this task, you must have database manager privileges or custom user permissions to manage the database in Rational DOORS. You must also have Jazz™ Administrator privileges on the Rational Quality Manager server.

For more information, see this video on YouTube about the Rational DOORS integration with Rational Quality Manager: IBM Rational DOORS and IBM Rational Quality Manager.

To configure this integration, you must perform the following tasks. For more information, see the integration documentation for Rational Quality Manager in the Rational solution for Collaborative Lifecycle Management (CLM) documentation.


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