Is it possible to generate sequential workitem IDs for specific type items
VK L (817●7●155●159)
| asked Jul 06 '12, 3:36 a.m.
edited Jul 06 '12, 7:46 a.m. by Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k●3●30●35)
Hi All,
Is it possible to have a different set of IDs for a specific workitem type so that it is sequential so that there are no gaps due to the distribution of IDs across all WI Types? Is this possible programatically using either custom attributes or other means? Thanks.
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Accepted answer
Ralph Schoon (63.1k●3●36●46)
| answered Sep 10 '14, 4:05 a.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER edited Oct 29 '19, 2:54 a.m. The result of the discussion above is:
The location for a solution is now https://github.com/jazz-community/rtc-workitem-numbering
Ralph Schoon selected this answer as the correct answer
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7 other answers
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Hi Geoff,
I am thinking of removing the other WI Templates from this project area - in case it would be possible to make it sequential starting from 1 using the standard WI ID itself (still other project areas are there in the repository with multiple WI Types.) Another alternative that i am thinking of is a custom attribute - "request number" should get incremented sequentially for every new item creation of 1 particular WI Type alone - Is this possible programatically? because here, it would need to read the last request number attribute's value. Thanks.
Comments
Ralph Schoon
commented Jul 09 '12, 2:42 a.m.
| edited Jun 01 '13, 2:14 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
Valli, if you want to go with the custom attribute, you would have to store the number somewhere e.g. in a file, and make sure the operation of getting the next number is thread safe. You might want to look into creating a value provider. Hi Valli, Just curious if you were able to resolve your issue with generating consecutive request number. I need to do something similar. Any guidance you can provide would be very helpful. 
Geoffrey Clemm
commented Jun 01 '13, 2:28 p.m.
FORUM ADMINISTRATOR / FORUM MODERATOR / JAZZ DEVELOPER
WRT Valli's two alternatives, the first wouldn't guarantee sequential numbers, because even if there is only one work item type in the project area, the system doesn't guarantee sequential version numbers (there can be gaps). So Valli's second alternative is the only approach I know of. You can add a custom post-condition to "save work item" where you can create the sequence number.
The issue is how do I find out the previous sequence number inside javascript. Is there is way to store the previous sequence number in a global variable of some sort. Ralph had suggested storing it in a file in a previous answer. Are there any code samples for reading/writing to a file on the server from javascript. You can't and re-reading the answers, you should not even try to attempt it. Let alone with JavaScript which has an API that does not provide a lot of access. The numbering is done internally making sure a unique number is chosen. You can probably not make sure you pick a unique numbering and as Goff points out, what do you do if you change a type. A sequential number might look nice in an excel sheet, but you don't use an excel sheet any more and the only important thing is, the number is unique and does not change.
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I also had the similar requirement for Japanese customer.
At that time I asked a question at following link:My Question about Workitem IDs Finally I developed the server-side plugin with the follow-up action feature for the requirement. If you are interested in my plugin, I can share that. However this plugin supports Japanese Only, unfortunately . If you want to re-use this plugin, you have to translate some messages... Comments Can you provide abit more details? I assume you create a custom attribute that can be used as ID, however the ID of the work item is still as it was.Is that correct?
Hi, Ralph.
Can you provide abit more details? I assume you create a custom attribute that can be used as ID, however the ID of the work item is still as it was.Is that correct?Yes, you are correct. I defined a custom attribute for the new WorkItem ID. The original WorkItem ID is still existing. Thank you very much for the information. I will get this question answered, so users are aware.
Yasuyuki Kubota, I also had to create a custom attribute to satisfy my customers requirements. I would love to have a copy of this plugin. RTC coudl easily fix this by allowing different tables for each work item type/category. This could easily be a choice on how you setup RTC. I have submitted enhancement requests bu they have been rejected. It seems easy from the outside, but it is not.
Ralph Schoon, I have used other CM tools that support this functionality, Changing types is not an issue and I have never had to do it. My end users typcally don't submit a Change Request as a defect or vice versa. If I entered data erroneously I would create a new item of the correct type and re-use the former work item if I had to, as this is what I did when using my previous tool which had the capability I am asking about. It isn't a huge deal, I have a work around, it just is cumbersome as I manually have to track my numbers, instead of allowing the tool to track my numbers automatically. Essentially the IDs that RTC provides me are useless except for my tasks, and change tracking which are not required to have a namimng convention and sequential numbers.
Thanks for you answer! I appreciate your time. Hi Ralph,
Hi Aaron,
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Hi Yasuyuki Kubota,
Can you please share the server-side plugin you have created for Japanese company?? As similar kind of requirement has been raised by Defense Services project for "Change Request". Thanks and Regards Shruti Joshi |
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Hi shruti joshi.
I have already uploaded my plugin in my project of the IBM DevOps Services. https://hub.jazz.net/project/strada501/RTC%20Work%20Item%20Numbering/overview I also uploaded the guidance for this plugin. Please check it before installing the plugin. Comments Hi Yasuyuki Kubota,
Hi shruti joshi
I moved this project to my IBM Cloud's toolchain Gitlab project.
Hi, consider sharing it in the Jazz Community: http://jazz-community.org/ I'm not a member of the jazz community github organization so I can't create a repository of the jazz community github organization.
I was able to. If that is an issue, send an email to ralph.schoon@de.ibm.com and I will make sure you can publish there, if you want. Maybe a link from there would be an option. I liked you on rsjazz.workpress.com.
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Can you please share the server-side plugin you have created for Japanese company. I am wanting to try this for my project and cannot find it via teh link above. |
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Hi, Shruti Joshi & Aaron Garcia
You can download the full contents of this plugin with following steps.
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Comments
Hi Valli,
can you tell me why this would be a requirement?
The only value of the number is to be unique from my perspective. Why do you want consecutive numbers? With respect to gaps, as soon as work items get closed you will have gaps anyway,if you are only looking at open items. Plus, if you change the type of the work item, what happens to the number in a scenario like you request?
As it works today, I think it just picks the next higher number. This is probably due to how the data is stored, indexed and also due to performance, the more complex you make it the slower it will be.
If you create work items programmatic, I think you can pick whatever number you want, unless it is not already used, in which case the storage layer will throw an exception,
Hi Ralph,
My consideration is more like having a single project for 1 WI Type alone - for all users to access.
Work Items have to be created by users only - though there would be operation advisors/participants running on the save operation to provide additional features.
Thanks.
I am not sure I understand why you have issues with the gaps. However, as far as I can tell, the work item number is unique on a repository. If you have another project they seem to share the number range.
Note that one issue will be that RTC allows you to change the type of a work item. What would you do in that case? If you change the sequence number, that makes any references to that work item by sequence number become invalid. It also would leave a "hole" in the sequence numbering of the original type.
Some of us work projects for the government that dictate numbering schemes for things like defects, and change requests. My CM Plan dictates the naming convention and that the CRs and Defects number sequentially. Additionally, for defects the naming convention is "YYYY-nnn" or my Change Requests naming convention is "PROJ-CR-nnn" PROJ indicates the project name, there is no way to do that in RTC withut creating additional attributes. The government Charter and CM plan dictate the convention, not the tool. So i have to add additional attributes to satisfy the requirement.
In regards to switching from one work item to the next, I woudln't. My attributes are totally different so i would delete the one that was incorrect it and then I would create a new work item in RTC, it isn't worh the time. In different CM tools I have even saved the incorrect one for re-use with the next work item of that type to keep the sequence correct.
The choice should be given to the end user to use work items collectively, or sperately so you can increment your work item, by type, and sequentially. Additionally I would love to be able to prempt the ID with a prefix like year, or project, if desired That would be my preference. I have seen other tools work this way and there were never any issues because of it.
Allowing independent work item sequencing would allow me to know I have 115 defects without having to run a query/report or have the spreadsheet do the math. I woudl simply have to look at the last work item ID.
Some examples of why some users care a lot about the ability to change the type of a work item:
- A user submits a work item with the wrong type (e.g. submits something as a task when it should be an enhancement request). This means it ends up with the wrong set of attributes. In RTC, you can just fix it by correcting the type.
- You've decided to modify your schema, and a batch of existing work items now should really be a different type.
Yes, there are other ways to handle these situations, but many users find retyping the work items to be the simplest and most intuitive way of doing so.