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Multiple process templates


Brian Thompson (41184) | asked Apr 16 '09, 4:42 p.m.
The area I work in is just starting to adopt RTC. A 'subproject' of our current development effort used RTC (using the Scrum template) and likes what they've seen.

Now we'd like to consider expanding our use of RTC to other parts of the project. However the project as a whole uses a 'modified waterfall' (i.e., NOT agile) process.

We're all one big happy family in CMVC so it would seem to make sense to be a single project in RTC. But it looks like we cannot have one team area using the scrum template and another team area using the open up template in a single project area.

Questions:

1) Is it (or will it be) possible to have different team areas of a single project use different process templates ?

2) Is there another approach our development team could use that supports 'multiple' templates being followed as part of a single product deliverable ?

Many thanks,

Brian

7 answers



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Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Apr 17 '09, 9:11 a.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
I agree with you that it would be best for these teams working on a
single product deliverable to be in the same project area, so they can
share the timelines, releases, and categories.

You will then have to customize the project areas separately, so that
they get the processes they want. You can achieve something close to
what a template would give you by just pasting in the process XML from
an existing team area with a similar process, when you create a new team
area.

Note though that whenever you want to upgrade the process in some way,
you would have to upgrade each of the team areas separately. But also
note that templates don't help with that, since they are just used to
initialize a project area, and can't be used to "upgrade" a project
area. We are working on a solution to this problem, namely, the
introduction of "process fragments", which would allow you to mix-in
different process fragments to different teams, but unfortunately, there
was not time to get this done for 2.0.

Cheers,
Geoff

bltjazz wrote:
The area I work in is just starting to adopt RTC. A 'subproject' of
our current development effort used RTC (using the Scrum template)
and likes what they've seen.

Now we'd like to consider expanding our use of RTC to other parts of
the project. However the project as a whole uses a 'modified
waterfall' (i.e., NOT agile) process.

We're all one big happy family in CMVC so it would seem to make sense
to be a single project in RTC. But it looks like we cannot have one
team area using the scrum template and another team area using the
open up template in a single project area.

Questions:

1) Is it (or will it be) possible to have different team areas of a
single project use different process templates ?

2) Is there another approach our development team could use that
supports 'multiple' templates being followed as part of a single
product deliverable ?

Many thanks,

Brian

permanent link
Brian Thompson (41184) | answered Apr 22 '09, 3:45 p.m.
When you say I can achieve 'something close to what a template would give' me, I interpret this to mean I can create a new team area with a different process than the other team areas in my project.

I am missing something. This was one of my attempts ...

Project A is scrum and contains a Team Area using the scrum process. I can take the Project Configuration Source from Project B's Project Area ( open up ), and entirely replace the corresponding Project Configuration Source in Project A's Project Area. Save. I then, in Project A, right click on the PA and choose New->Team Area then create a new TA. I find the new TA looks like the old scrum version, not the Project B's open up. I judge this by looking at the 'Plan' of the newly created TA and see sprints (scrum) rather than Inception/Elaboration/Construction/Transition (open up).

I certainly see in Project A's newly replaced Proj Config Src xml the <development> and iteration definition tags defining the I/E/C/T iterations.

I tried a couple of other variations on the theme, but so far no luck.

Hints, pointers or explanations would all be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for your time and patience.

Brian

permanent link
Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Apr 22 '09, 8:18 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
Yes, "close to what a template would give" only applies to the part of
the process that you can override in the team area. For example, you
cannot override the categories, timeline, iteration types, dashboards,
work item types, or releases. To change any of those, you'd need to
create a separate team area.

Cheers,
Geoff

bltjazz wrote:
When you say I can achieve 'something close to what a template would
give' me, I interpret this to mean I can create a new team area with
a different process than the other team areas in my project.

I am missing something. This was one of my attempts ...

Project A is scrum and contains a Team Area using the scrum process.
I can take the Project Configuration Source from Project B's Project
Area ( open up ), and entirely replace the corresponding Project
Configuration Source in Project A's Project Area. Save. I then, in
Project A, right click on the PA and choose New->Team Area then
create a new TA. I find the new TA looks like the old scrum version,
not the Project B's open up. I judge this by looking at the 'Plan' of
the newly created TA and see sprints (scrum) rather than
Inception/Elaboration/Construction/Transition (open up).

I certainly see in Project A's newly replaced Proj Config Src xml the
development> and iteration definition tags defining the
I/E/C/T iterations.

I tried a couple of other variations on the theme, but so far no
luck.

Hints, pointers or explanations would all be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for your time and patience.

Brian

permanent link
Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Apr 22 '09, 8:45 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
Note: I meant to write "need to create a separate project area".

Cheers,
Geoff

Geoffrey Clemm wrote:
Yes, "close to what a template would give" only applies to the part of
the process that you can override in the team area. For example, you
cannot override the categories, timeline, iteration types, dashboards,
work item types, or releases. To change any of those, you'd need to
create a separate team area.

Cheers,
Geoff

bltjazz wrote:
When you say I can achieve 'something close to what a template would
give' me, I interpret this to mean I can create a new team area with
a different process than the other team areas in my project.
I am missing something. This was one of my attempts ...

Project A is scrum and contains a Team Area using the scrum process. I
can take the Project Configuration Source from Project B's Project
Area ( open up ), and entirely replace the corresponding Project
Configuration Source in Project A's Project Area. Save. I then, in
Project A, right click on the PA and choose New->Team Area then
create a new TA. I find the new TA looks like the old scrum version,
not the Project B's open up. I judge this by looking at the 'Plan' of
the newly created TA and see sprints (scrum) rather than
Inception/Elaboration/Construction/Transition (open up).
I certainly see in Project A's newly replaced Proj Config Src xml the
development> and iteration definition tags defining the
I/E/C/T iterations.
I tried a couple of other variations on the theme, but so far no
luck.

Hints, pointers or explanations would all be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for your time and patience.

Brian

permanent link
Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Apr 22 '09, 8:57 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
Sigh ... sorry about the multiple self-followups.

The iterations are not defined in the process XML (because they are
usually not re-usable for another project, because of information like
start/end dates). So pasting in a new process XML does not affect the
list of iterations of the project area.

Cheers,
Geoff


Geoffrey Clemm wrote:
Note: I meant to write "need to create a separate project area".

Cheers,
Geoff

Geoffrey Clemm wrote:
Yes, "close to what a template would give" only applies to the part of
the process that you can override in the team area. For example, you
cannot override the categories, timeline, iteration types, dashboards,
work item types, or releases. To change any of those, you'd need to
create a separate team area.

Cheers,
Geoff

bltjazz wrote:
When you say I can achieve 'something close to what a template would
give' me, I interpret this to mean I can create a new team area with
a different process than the other team areas in my project. I am
missing something. This was one of my attempts ...

Project A is scrum and contains a Team Area using the scrum process.
I can take the Project Configuration Source from Project B's Project
Area ( open up ), and entirely replace the corresponding Project
Configuration Source in Project A's Project Area. Save. I then, in
Project A, right click on the PA and choose New->Team Area then
create a new TA. I find the new TA looks like the old scrum version,
not the Project B's open up. I judge this by looking at the 'Plan' of
the newly created TA and see sprints (scrum) rather than
Inception/Elaboration/Construction/Transition (open up).
I certainly see in Project A's newly replaced Proj Config Src xml the
development> and iteration definition tags defining the
I/E/C/T iterations. I tried a couple of other variations on the
theme, but so far no
luck.

Hints, pointers or explanations would all be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for your time and patience.

Brian

permanent link
Brian Thompson (41184) | answered Sep 02 '09, 10:24 a.m.
I understand one can share a stream across Project Areas. (In our case we have two different templates in use for the same product release being developed - hence 2 PAs).

As set up currently the PAs are running under the same RTC server on server_1.

Worrying about the future, can PAs on different servers also share a stream? They're planning to add more servers due to space limitations and I would like to know if I need to raise a fuss for technical reasons to keep all our PAs (who share code) on the same RTC server - or will be able to flow our changes between RTC instances on server_1 and the other on server_2 ?

Thank you.

permanent link
Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Sep 02 '09, 6:43 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
As a general comment, having two different project areas for the same
release is undesireable, because teams cannot share the same timeline,
and agile planning cannot do automated roll-ups of the work into a
single product plan. If possible, it is better to have one project area
with multiple team areas, and do your process customization in the team
areas.

Although we are looking into increasing the level of sharing between
repositories, currently (in RTC-2.x), it is best to keep all project
areas that want to share information in the same repository. In
particular, in RTC-2.x, changes cannot be delivered between repositories.

Cheers,
Geoff

bltjazz wrote:
I understand one can share a stream across Project Areas. (In our
case we have two different templates in use for the same product
release being developed - hence 2 PAs).

As set up currently the PAs are running under the same RTC server on
server_1.

Worrying about the future, can PAs on different servers also share a
stream? They're planning to add more servers due to space
limitations and I would like to know if I need to raise a fuss for
technical reasons to keep all our PAs (who share code) on the same
RTC server - or will be able to flow our changes between RTC
instances on server_1 and the other on server_2 ?

Thank you.

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