Baseline + links (Help needed)

Mathias Mamsch - Mon Feb 20 16:46:36 EST 2012
Also differentiate between in-link references and links. A link is stored at the source object, so you can not baseline in-links per definition. The only thing that can be baselined are in link references, which tell you, that at the time of baselining there was an in link there from a module, but that link might or might not exist anymore. You have neither link suspicions nor other link attributes (like created on, by) at an in link reference.

In-Link references might get lost, after the baseline. The easiest way to achieve this is, to draw a link from the same source object to the baseline as in the in link reference. If you then delete the link, the link reference is gone. Therefore you cannot rely on in link references in baselines. You should only evaluate baselined outlinks or as Kevin said, use a baseline set to ensure that your links are baselined correctly. Regards, Mathias

SystemAdmin - Mon Feb 20 21:52:15 EST 2012
Thank you for your quick response.
I guess I used the wrong verbiage stating my question. I knew that you couldn't baseline the actual links; is there a way of restoring the link references to the state the Module was baselined.

-Jim

Mathias Mamsch - Tue Feb 21 03:51:50 EST 2012
You cannot recreate the non-echoed (baselined) inlink references in DOORS. The only way to do this would be to restore the inlinks.dtc from a backup in the database. Note however that this way, you would replace all existing in link references, and would therefore have a good chance of breaking other echoed links. Those would then need to be deleted and recreated. And with a bit of luck, you might have your links back. Regards, Mathias

llandale - Tue Feb 21 11:45:00 EST 2012
So theoretically of course, the following is possible??:

1. Capture all incoming links information in some text attribute (fullName source, fullName LinkMod, AbsNo source object)
2. replace inlinks.dtc from backup
3. do some clever link-by-attribute, ignoring duplicated links

Mathias Mamsch - Wed Feb 22 11:35:12 EST 2012
I would rather say, if you have a script that will dump all the echoed inlinks to a text file and one that will recreate those links, you should (theoretically of course) be able to do so. You might however still need luck ;-)

I learned shortly that you can put an unpacked text file in the server repository and that DOORS will pack it automatically the next time it writes the file. Therefore if you know the format of the .dtc files you can also write a new one from scratch (super theoretically of course).

llandale - Wed Feb 22 13:52:42 EST 2012
Theoretically one could edit the doorsd.exe file, find out where the packing occurs and bypass it; which would get the server to write un-packed *.dtc files allowing one to see examples of the various formats.

SystemAdmin - Wed Feb 22 16:44:52 EST 2012
Does anyone remember the good o'l days when the DOORS DB was comprised mostly of unencrypted text files and you could get the adrenalin pumping when you performed a bit of risky on the edge DIY data surgery?