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Prevent-Edit property of Work Item does not apply to Adding Links from Other Work Items


Nadra Rafee (45527) | asked Jan 17 '18, 6:07 p.m.
edited Jan 17 '18, 6:09 p.m.

Using RTC version 6.0.4, I can set a precondition to prevent editing of a particular Work Item type if it is in a specified state.
For example, a work item of type 'Epic' can't be edited when in a state of 'In Progress'.

This precondition prevents me from adding any links to any Epic when in a state of In Progress.

I can, however, add links from other work items to this Epic indirectly - which should be prevented as well.

How do I prevent any editing of this epic, including linking with new work items?

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Ralph Schoon (63.1k33645) | answered Jan 24 '18, 9:04 a.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER

Strict Group policy is obviously something totally different than this one. This one would have to detect the link change the other one detects the work item save.

To repeat myself here and add an option:

I think if it is not implemented as you assume the options are

  1. A defect if you thin this is a defect
  2. An enhancement request to get what you want
  3. An additional advisor that adds your rule and keeps the old functionality to stay compatible - which is also an enhancement request
  4. A custom advisor you create yourself
Just note that there are certain kinds of links the the work item save and other operations can not even detect when being create e.g. track/contributes to.

Nadra Rafee selected this answer as the correct answer

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Michael Dexter (9221114) | answered Jan 24 '18, 8:44 a.m.

But RTC does have the ability to check the "parent artifact". In the case of "Strict Group" policy, which Requires all children to be resolved before the parent can be resolved, and requires the parent to be open before a child can be added or re-opened.

Here I am checking the parent state before I am able to reopen the child.

I believe this is an oversight from IBM on the "Prevent Editing" advisor and without this functionality we have no way to freeze the scope of the Epic.


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Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Jan 19 '18, 1:01 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER

 Adding a link to something is never considered a modification of that thing.   You can add links from web pages, in email, and a wide variety of other places, none of which can logically be prevented (nor should it be).


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Nadra Rafee commented Jan 19 '18, 2:04 p.m.

Thank you for your response.
I beg to disagree here as adding a parent-child relationship can change the work scope and had direct impact on the team plans.

While you are not allowed to add the link when you directly open the work item due to the precondition enforcement, it should not be allowed in other ways as this is bypass (back-door) of the enforcement rule.

All links are bi-directional .. so if it is not allowed one way, it should not be allowed in other ways.

Thoughts?


Ralph Schoon commented Jan 19 '18, 4:48 p.m. | edited Jan 19 '18, 4:49 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER

I think if it is not implemented as you assume the options are

  1. An enhancement request to get what you want
  2. An additional advisor that adds your rule - which is also an enhancement request
  3. A custom advisor you create yourself

Just note that there are certain kinds of links the the work item save and other operations can not even detect when being create e.g. track/contributes to.


Geoffrey Clemm commented Jan 20 '18, 1:38 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER

One clarification ... when I referred to a link "to something", I was referring to the "target" of the link.   I do consider that creating a link "from something" (from the "source" of the link) should be a modification to that source artifact.   In the case of a parent-child link, I would want that to be a modification of the parent, but not a modification of the child.  Note that this is how things are designed/implemented for versioned artifacts in the Jazz tools.

But you are correct that this model is not what is found for all of the RTC link types.   In particular, the addition of a parent-child link to some parent artifact does not require a save of the parent artifact, and therefore does not trigger the built-in read-protection.
So you are left with the options that Ralph describes in his comment.

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