IBM Rational Quality Manager
Quality management · Manual testing · Continuous improvement
Rational Quality Manager 3.0 Release Candidate 0 (Beta 2) Milestone
Rational Quality Manager 3.0 RC0 "New and Noteworthy"
Here are some of the most noteworthy items in Rational Quality Manager 3.0. See the Jazz Foundation new and noteworthy page or new features in the Jazz Team Server. Rational Quality Manager uses a server that includes common services for multiple collaborative lifecycle management products. If you intend to try these other products you may wish to read the 3.0 RC0 new and noteworthy for Rational DOORS Requirements Professional and Rational Team Concert.
IBM Rational Reporting for Development Intelligence
IBM Rational Reporting for Development Intelligence (RRDI) is an optional program which can be used to create and customize reports using IBM Cognos Business Intelligence. These reports consume data from the data warehouse, and can be viewed in the CCM, QM and RM application dashboards and web UI. The applications also include a number of sample reports which can be used as is, or as the basis for customization. Download RRDI.
Improved printing
Your ability to print test artifacts is much improved in terms of performance, scalability, and usability. Overall, generated documents are more complete and more consistent across all supported artifacts. Performance and scalability improvements include the following:
- Print jobs will run faster and consume less memory. <
- The printing framework no longer limits comprehensive print jobs to a certain number of linked artifacts
- You can now configure printing to utilize multiple threads for concurrent execution of print jobs.
- Print jobs will run faster and consume less memory.
Usability improvements include the following:
- New "print queue" UI shows all the print jobs that you have requested recently. <
- You can now track the progress of your print job as it executes.
- You can re-download any print jobs that have not yet expired (configurable time frame)
- Print button menus are more consistent and understandable.
- The overall appearance of documents has been refined to be more visually appealing and to make it easier to find information.
Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration (OSLC)
RC0 provides a tech preview of the OSLC V2 Quality Management (QM) API. The V2 API brings alignment with the new OSLC core specification. Three new types of resources are defined in QM V2: TestScript, TestExecutionRecord, and TestResult. Query support is also provided. Rational Quality Manager also provides a server setting in Jazz Advanced Properties that allows the Rational Quality Manager web UI to consume the OSLC V2 Change Management (CM) and Requirements Management (RM) APIs.
Query support for saved filters in the Table listing view
The filters in the Table listing view can be saved as queries and retrieved at a later time.
There is a simple management tool for deleting saved queries and promoting selected queries to the application menu.
The promoted queries will appear in a drop-down menu off the View menus for several artifact types.
Also, each query will be saved in its own tab.
Offline manual test execution
Users can run manual tests in offline mode. Users can initiate this by going to the Test Execution Record (TER) table, selecting a TER, and clicking Run Offline.
This downloads an RQMS file. Users can then go offline (without direct access to the server) and use Microsoft Excel to import this RQMS file. Users must download and install the latest Excel addon from RQM Extras to see this new action. Once installed, users can import the RQMS file into Excel, run the test, and add actual results with images, comments etc.
After the test is completed, the user can then upload the result back to Rational Quality Manager using an option in Excel.
New default test case and test plan templates for systems and software testing
There are three new test plan templates for systems and software testing, as shown below:
There is one new test case template, as shown below:
You can view the available templates by clicking Manage Templates.
Custom attributes on test artifacts
Users can now define custom attributes on various artifact types, including test plans, test cases, test scripts, test suites, test case results, and test suite results.
The attributes are defined under System Properties and are visible when editing the artifacts, as well as in the table list views for the various artifacts. Artifacts can be sorted and filtered based on the custom attributes.
Both Task-Quality work items and default defects are now tracked by the OSLC-CM task provider
Task-Quality work items include the section work item for test cases, test suites and test plans, and the artifact work item for test suites. Prior to this release, these work items, as well as defects, were tracked internally. These work items and defects are now tracked by your Configuration Management (CM) provider. If you use Rational Team Concert 3.0 as your CM provider, you can now view the remote work item in an embedded tab within Rational Quality Manager. The My Task viewlet will be updated accordingly to show the remote Task-Quality work items and defects. Back links are also created automatically for traceability and navigation.
Improve navigation across projects and between products
Rational Quality Manager now makes use of rich hovers in tables and editors where appropriate to provide richer context. Requirement and Defect menus are driven by registered service providers. Each registered service provider appears as a group with menu actions exposed via the provider's discovery document.
Test suite enhancements
A number of new management capabilities have been added to test suites to bring them in line with test plans and test cases. Test suites now support templates, formal review, and sections.
Additionally, users can add reference test suites from a test plan.Common application banner
The Rational Quality Manager application banner has been updated to conform to the CLM common style. Several items have been moved. The Admin menu is now in the banner bar next to the Help. The project selector has been replaced by the new Home menu which is under the house icon.
Requirement viewer
A new viewer for external requirements is now provided. Imported requirements can be viewed in a tab. The viewer displays imported attributes including links to the external URL of the requirement artifact. If the requirement is linked to a test artifact (test plan, test case), those will be displayed as well.
Support for RequisitePro custom attribues
You can now configure RequisitePro custom attributes in the Server Administration UI. This feature requires a specail patch from RequisitePro. To configure these attribues:
- Click Server Administration -> Advanced Properties and search for com.ibm.rqm.requirement.sync.SyncRequestProcessor>.
- Edit the 'Current Value Customize attributes of ReqPRo' to add the custom attributes. Separate the attributes with a comma.
The attributes will sync with Rational Quality Manager and will be displayed in the import dialog and view table. By default, the columns will be hidden. You can enable the columns in the display settings.
Query support
It is now possible to save your column filtering choices in the Table view as a query.
Performance improvements
Performance of Rational Quality Manager to ReqPro integration when using ReqPro 7.1.1.1 is improved.
Performance of test suite execution is improved.
History view
A new history view in the test plan and test case editors allows you to see audit history.
Tab management
Better tab management allows users to better manage multiple tabs.
Common work item support
Rational Quality Manager now leverages common workitem support for its out of the box defects and task quality work items. This allows customers to use a single work item repository for both Rational Quality Manager and Rational Team Concert users. The workitem editor is visible as a tab in this milestone. The My Task viewlet in the dashboard is also updated to display remote tasks stored in the task provider.
Improved defect linking
Improved defect linking. When defects are created from Rational Quality Manager, CLM links on the defect are created to the related test case, test plan, requirement, and plan item. Additionally, when these defects are viewed in Rational Team Concert, rich hover text is now supported so you can see test execution results and test execution records.