Is there a way to import a complex ClearCase env to RTC?
By complex I mean many hardlinks, sym-links and hard coded Makefiles.
I heard that RTC does not have sym-links.

Thank you,

"53x11"

I am also interested in how to handle symlinks when converting
ClearCase projects. We have a common library VOB, which stores
validated copies of .jar files, in which other projects symlink to
the libraries they need. For security and audit purposes, software
developers are not allowed to check in library files into version
control, only the configuration management team. I've been told that
this functionality was not considered in RTC. Anyone have ideas on
how to include a selected list of secured libraries into a project,
other than replicating these libraries into every project?

Could you clarify why the ability to have version-controlled sym links
solves the problem of a user not being able to check in library files?

Cheers,
Geoff


Geoff,
In our environment, software developers can freely link to any authenticated library file from a secured repository. Library files that developers check in themselves are not guaranteed to be free of malicious code or undocumented changes, especially if they have the same name as a commonly used open source library. OK, this probably wouldn't happen, but our audit standards and guidelines state that we cannot allow this potential exposure. This is only an issue because our project design relies on imbedded runtime libraries in the .war file. Other places I've worked allowed no runtime libraries in the distribution files, and that all runtime libraries were securely maintained on the server. Developers could check in any library file they needed to compile. In our environment, this is somewhat difficult because our applications are sent to servers that we do not own or operate. Could we have two distribution files, the application and the runtime libraries? Maybe. We've kicked around some ideas on how to use and validate the authenticity of library files in our current environment. We've previously solved this using symlinks but we need to implement an alternate method of handling them. Aside from that, it is more efficient to allow 10 projects to use one copy of a library instead of 10 copies of the same library in 10 projects.

What would you suggest for a migration path when the build depends on
hardlinks and symkinks? Is there support to migrate a complex system
from ClearCase to RTC? Where the VOB's have links to other VOB's.
Does this mean we need to re-architect our entire system? What error
is shown during import when the system finds sym or harlinks?

gmclemmwrote:
That is correct. The RTC SCM system doesn't yet support the creation
of
sym-link versions (feel free to support/comment on work item
40443).
It also doesn't yet support the creation of hard link versions (feel

free to support/comment on work item 58190).

Cheers,
Geoff


thebigring wrote:
Is there a way to import a complex ClearCase env to RTC?
By complex I mean many hardlinks, sym-links and hard coded
Makefiles.
I heard that RTC does not have sym-links.

Thank you,

"53x11"

Could you clarify why the ability to have version-controlled sym
links
solves the problem of a user not being able to check in library
files?
Cheers,
Geoff


Geoff,
In our environment, software developers can freely link to any
authenticated library file from a secured repository. Library files
that developers check in themselves are not guaranteed to be free of
malicious code or undocumented changes, especially if they have the
same name as a commonly used open source library. OK, this probably
wouldn't happen, but our audit standards and guidelines state that we
cannot allow this potential exposure. This is only an issue because
our project design relies on imbedded runtime libraries in the .war
file. Other places I've worked allowed no runtime libraries in the
distribution files, and that all runtime libraries were securely
maintained on the server. Developers could check in any library file
they needed to compile. In our environment, this is somewhat
difficult because our applications are sent to servers that we do not
own or operate. Could we have two distribution files, the application
and the runtime libraries? Maybe. We've kicked around some ideas on
how to use and validate the authenticity of library files in our
current environment. We've previously solved this using symlinks but
we need to implement an alternate method of handling them. Aside from
that, it is more efficient to allow 10 projects to use one copy of a
library instead of 10 copies of the same library in 10 projects.

Thanks Geoff, that is one of the solutions we are considering. We've
never considered that using the symlink capabilities in ClearCase was
"fake" to place a copy of that file in a Windows view, it
sure seems real to us. Like I stated before, it surely is more
efficient to have 10 projects link to a single version controlled
copy than have each project version control the same file.

I didn't mean for "fake" to have a pejorative tone ... perhaps I should
have said "simulate" ... symbolic links are very useful, but
unfortunately, Windows does not provide them...