version control vs EA Security

[SomersetGraham]

Hello all
What is the general feeling regarding using third party version control system or using the security features built into EA
What are you using
What are the pros and cons for each

[qwerty]

I'd always use EA security/locking. First the XMI overhead for each change imposes a big overhead and a possible damage for the model (esp. sequence diagrams; wrong use of Get Latest). Second the background for VC comes from source code maintenance. For that purpose it's fine and the recent tools like git and Mercurial show a tendency to individual development which makes them really valuable tools - for code development. UML modeling is something completely different from code engineering (my opinion). You need to communicate directly to see the whole picture at once. As soon as you decouple parts of the system you run into big trouble. Merging independent parts then turns into an extra task which is (sometimes) more costly than the modeling behind it. People tend to forget this and think VC will bring it free of charge.

q.

[RobCDeJong]

I support the post of qwerty. We started out with version control (SVN) but had to move to EA security/locking because of frequently damaged models. Since the transition we do not have any problems anymore.

The one thing that I miss since the transition, is commit comments. The reason of change, was previously noted as commit comment, is now unknown. With auditing on, you can see who made the change but the why is not recorded anymore.

cheers,
Rob

[SomersetGraham]

Thanks

[Helmut Ortmann]

Hello,

if you want to work according to SPICE, CMMI, Functional Safety or so you usually have no chance to decide not to use VC.

In my experiences it's more easy to work without VC. If you take care about some known issues working with VC also works.

In my opinion:

• If you use EA for a new development use no VC
• If you use EA to make mostly changes to an existing system VC is useful
• If you work with suppliers over a slow WAN via VPN think about VC
• For creative work VC obstructs more than it helps

So in my opinion it depends of your requirements and your organisation.

Kind regards,

Helmut

[qwerty]

So in my opinion it depends of your requirements and your organisation.

Definitely! There is no silver bullet and config management is a part of each project that should not be underestimated.

q.

[Stefan Bolleininger]

Dear Helmut,

personally I prefer the not-vc handling (much easier).

However I'm interrested in the special requirements of SPICE which you can't fulfill with the interal security settings and restrictive lock. Could do explain me the issues you want to be aware by using the VC?

I don't use the VC and I think I'm compliant (Maybe I got another kind of view and need to adapt my opinion.)

Regards

Stefan

[Helmut Ortmann]

Hello,

CM (Configuration Management) is defined in SPICE as SUP.8. Other processes have similare requirements.

According to SPICE:
The purpose of the Configuration management process is to establish
and  maintain  the  integrity  of  all  the  work  products  of  a  process  or project and make them available to concerned parties.

In other words: You have to organize your work in a way that you are at any time able to get a consistent set of documents of historical releases. This includes model information as well as source code and a lot more.

Think of a change request which involves changes in model and code. You want to be able to undo this change.

To achieve these in a reliable way a lot of companies are using CM tools.

Of course: It's a lot easier not to use Configuration Management. Maybe often it's good enough to have some baselines.

To make a good decision you have to know:
- EA and it's possibilities
- Your development process
- The culture of your organisation

Then you are able to make a sound decision.

Kind regards,

Helmut

[Stefan Bolleininger]

The restictive lock in combination with baselines is some kind of version control which can fully fulfill these requirements.

The only mismatches which i'm remembering: It is possible to change the items without direct authorization or request

the elements are not controlled (which has to be implemented seperately) and I don't know if any VC can work this out directly.

In my working area (Medical devices and healthcare with the standarts ISO13485, IEC62304 and FDA 820 and ca. the half of Part 11) the non-VC but baselining and restrictive lock and auditing is fully compliant.

The change control of approved items is handled by my Addin.

Regards

Stefan

[Geert Bellekens]

Another reason to use VC is when you want to share a "common" model (such as a framework) among different repositories.

And also if you want to control who has write access to certain parts of the model.

Geert

[qwerty]

Another reason to use VC is when you want to share a "common" model (such as a framework) among different repositories.

And also if you want to control who has write access to certain parts of the model.

Geert

However, you can easily mimic that with locking and XMI ex-/import. But as said above, YMMV.

q.

[Ignacio G. T.]

We are beginning to use VC with EA in a new project. The team is small, but very used to work with version control, even with 'binary' documents.

We will use local (not shared) .eap files, with Subversion as the VC. So, in the end, we will be sharing the models via Subversion, just as we do with other artifacts.

In addition to the 'standard' version procedures that EA provides (serializing with XMI, etc.) we plan to maintain the master .eap files themselves (in parallel) in the Subversion repository as a kind of versioned backup, updated at specific phases of the project, just in case something goes bad.

I hope we have made the right decision. Time will tell...

[Helmut Ortmann]

Hello,

I personally have good and bad experiences with VC and EA.

In a local working environment I would prefer to use a DBMS
 like SQL Server, mySQL or whatever you like and is supported by EA.

In a slow WAN environment I would use EA remote with *.eap files and a central DBMS.

With EA release 9 and above and storing the external identifiers it should work.

Be aware of:
- In sequence diagrams only use instances and never external classes or actors.
- In some release there are problems with Action Pins (reported bug)

Good luck. It would be fine to hear from your experiences.

Kind regards,

Helmut