Product Documentation
Abstract
IBM Rational Change 5.2 Known Problems and Workarounds
Content
Known problems and workarounds new to release 5.2:
ID | Problem and Workaround |
R#31401 | Extended text attributes that are DCMed to pre-5.2 releases will be displayed with formatting mark-up in those releases unless a patch is applied. Get the latest release-appropriate patch to display extended text attributes as plain text in older releases. |
R#31519 | The default WASCE memory settings are insufficient for Change. The workaround described below should be made prior to installing Change. Restart WASCE after making this change. Windows: Add the following line to WASCE_HOME\bin\setenv.bat before installation Change: set JAVA_OPTS=-Xmx512m -XX:MaxPermSize=64m UNIX: Add the following line to WASCE_HOME/bin/setenv.sh JAVA_OPTS="-Xmx512m -XX:MaxPermSize=64m" Further tweaking of the JVM memory settings may be necessary when running multiple web applications, including more than one instance of Change. You may have to experiment with the "-Xmxsize" and "-XX:MaxPermSize=size" flags. |
R#31537 | WAS makes of copy of the web.xml file in the Change installation area. Thus, when making changes to web.xml (such as when changing the port number or protocol) on WAS, you must edit WAS_HOME\profiles\PROFILE_NAME\config\cells\CELL_NAME\applications\APPLICATION_NAME.ear\deployments\APPLICATION_NAME\APPLICATION_NAME.war\WEB-INF\web.xml not CHANGE_APP_HOME\WEB-INF\web.xml. |
R#31538 | The Perl API setUpConnection(protocol, host, port) has been deprecated and should be replaced with setUpConnection(url) This affects custom Perl scripts and triggers, which need to be updated to continue working. Triggers may use TriggerParser->get_url() to return the server URL. The URL should be of the form http://host:port/context (e.g., http://localhost:8080/change). |
R#31545 | Certain resources (such as the dev_clnt process listed by "ccm monitor") are not released when the Change web application is restarted through the application server (WAS or WASCE). If repeated restarts lead to performance degradation, restart the application server, which will release these resources. |
R#31589 | A patch is required for earlier versions of central server to work with Change 5.2 in the same central server cluster. Ensure central server releases prior to 5.2 are at least at patch level 5.0 04 or 5.1 06. |
R#31654 | Errors may occur when saving ECP_process.xml or other large CR processes on WASCE. To address this, set the maximum POST data size in WASCE: 1. WASCE server Admin console -> Web Server -> TomcatWebConnector -> edit 2. Change the value of the parameter “maxPostSize” from default value to 0 or <0 to disable the post size limit. This requires a restart of the “TomcatWebConnector”. |
R#32451 | The help page "Scripts for Managing Listbox Values" has a table of variables that are wrong. The correct variables are listed in a comment in the browserInfo.js file mentioned on that page. |
R#32517 | Change does not correctly run in both HTTP and HTTPS protocols simultaneously; it must be run as one or the other. Note that WAS makes of copy of the web.xml file in the Change installation area. Thus, when making changes to web.xml (such as when changing the port number or protocol) on WAS, you must edit WAS_HOME\profiles\PROFILE_NAME\config\cells\CELL_NAME\applications\APPLICATION_NAME.ear\deployments\APPLICATION_NAME\APPLICATION_NAME.war\WEB-INF\web.xml, not CHANGE_APP_HOME\WEB-INF\web.xml. |
R#32670 | Taking an attribute that is of type CCM_EXTENDED_TEXT and converting it to any other type will result in the extended text markup being displayed within the transition log. For example, making _COMMENTS webtype CCM_EXTENDED_TEXT, adding notes with markup and then converting _COMMENTS back to CCM_TEXT will result in the transition log not displaying the old comments that were created as extended text correctly. |
R#32916 | Customized email notification templates (.tmpl files) used with previous releases of the ECP NotificationTemplates package need to be updated to import plugins from the ChangeSynergy package. For example, replace: //%®isterContentPlugin('reportPlugin', $_bt_dict, '')% //%®isterContentPlugin('mimePlugin', $_bt_dict, $_bt_dict)% With: //%®isterContentPlugin('ChangeSynergy::reportPlugin', $_bt_dict, '')% //%®isterContentPlugin('ChangeSynergy::mimePlugin', $_bt_dict, $_bt_dict)% |
R#32960 | When installing Change against WAS or WASCE, the web server port number in the installer incorrectly defaults to port 8600. The user should instead enter the actual port number of the application server. |
R#33036 | The package CMMI_MatrixReports should only be used with ECP_process. Additionally, it should be installed after ECP_process, not before. It may have errors with other processes. |
N/A | When restarting the Rational Change application through WASCE (for instance, after applying a patch), use the stop/start sequence rather than restart. This is necessary because in WASCE the semantics of restart is not the same as stop/start, and certain components will not be reloaded as expected. See https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/GERONIMO-4794 for details. |
R#38655 | The email submission feature (a.k.a. tokenless submission) that was deprecated in release 5.0 is no longer supported. The Perl and web service APIs can be used to implement similar functionality. |
Known problems and workarounds carried forward from previous releases:
ID | Problem and Workaround | ||||||||||||||||||
N/A | Rational Change provides configurable date formats that are independent of locale; it does not adapt numeric formats or sorting orders according to the locale. Rational Change does not support right-to-left layouts and scripts (bi-di). | ||||||||||||||||||
PS#291 | Transition and report links fail after switching between hostname and IP address URLs, as this invalidates all existing cookies used by the system. To address this, users must delete their cookies after this setting is changed to ensure that transitions and reports will work properly. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#1144 | Session start-up may fail if the Synergy session user does not have the role specified by initial_role in the .ccm.ini file. To resolve this, give the Synergy session user the role specified by initial_role. | ||||||||||||||||||
PS#1382 | The Change installer only allows 7-bit (US ASCII) characters in paths. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#2491 | Only one user should be logged into the Admin interface at a time or overwritten changes may result. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#2853 | Be careful when defining the list of modifiable attributes. If you select an attribute that has a dependent attribute, you should also add the dependent attribute to the modifiable list because the dependent attribute's value will automatically change as the user changes the parent value. For example, if Product Version is dependent on Product Name, when the user changes the Product Name, the Product Version is reset automatically. When the user clicks the Save button, which tries to modify both the Product Name and Product Version, the command will fail because Product Version is not defined as a modifiable attribute. | ||||||||||||||||||
PS#2977 | Bulk transition does not work across databases. The bulk transition operation on CRs in different databases (e.g., from a report using CM Build Queries) may either fail with the message "Could not Execute Command; Try Again" or produce incorrect results. This is because bulk transition references the CRs by CVID, and all CVIDs are assumed to be from the same database (the one the user is logged into). | ||||||||||||||||||
W#2999 | In the rare event that two users modify the same CR simultaneously, changes made by the the first user to click the Save button take precedence. Modification for the second user fails because the form now contains outdated data and must be reloaded. In this event, the changes made on the form of the second user are lost because the browser window is overwritten with the error message. To restore the changes, do the following: 1. Bring back the modified form by issuing the browser command Alt + back arrow. 2. Log in a second time and show the CR to be modified. 3. Reapply the changes by cutting and pasting from one window to the other. | ||||||||||||||||||
PS#3130 | Invoking Synergy dialogs against objects may not work correctly for certain object types. For example, when using the "DPR - Summary with Tasks and Task Folder" format, an error message will be displayed if you try to invoke a Synergy dialog from the context menu of the task folder. This is because the object operations are not applicable to task folders. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#3728 | Conflicting task priority values may result between a CR and its associated task. When auto-assigning a task (by checking Create Task during Submit and Assign or during CR assignment), task priority is set to "medium," yet if you change it, the other values are numerical (1-4). This is a historical peculiarity due to a shared attribute name between CRs and tasks. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#4054 | The search index is invalidated after:
Both of these problems are remedied by recreating the search index. This is done by logging into the Admin interface, clicking the Administration button, navigating to the General Administration tab, and then clicking Regenerate Index. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#4281 | If you reduce the maximum number of sessions on a host that is currently running more than that number, the additional sessions will not be dropped automatically to correctly represent the server settings. To get this effect, adjust the users/session ratio or disable and then re-enable the host. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#4367 | Simultaneous start-up of Synergy sessions may cause ACcent aborts on Windows servers. To prevent this, in the Admin interface, click the Administration button and navigate to the Server tab. Use -u temp_directory_path for the "Optional start arguments" field (e.g., -u c:\temp). | ||||||||||||||||||
W#4853 | Bulk transitions and bulk modifications do not span pages in a paged report. When using the bulk operations, all CRs must be on the same page of the report. It is not possible to select CRs across pages in a paged report. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#5395 | The Change log file, event.log, should not be deleted from the file system manually, because if you do, it will not be re-created unless you restart Change. Instead, clear the log file from the Admin interface or through the API. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#5469 | When installing a package that consists of a set of XML report definitions, you must use the package type of "CUSTOMIZATION"; otherwise, the report definitions will not be installed. Only report packages—that is, packages that contain actual report templates, not report definitions—should use the package type of "CSREPORT". | ||||||||||||||||||
W#5844 | Perl triggers using HTTPS on Windows may have noticeably slower performance as compared to using HTTP. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#5940 | Performing the "Validate Listbox Configuration Data" operation may take several minutes depending on the complexity of the listbox dependency chain and the number of items in the sublistboxes. The message "A script is taking a long time; do you want to abort?" may appear. If so, do not abort the script; rather, let it run to completion. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#6415 | A trigger that is not written carefully may cause an infinite loop which will crash Change. This happens if a modification trigger modifies the same CR for which the trigger was initially fired, because this in turn fires the trigger again. There are two workarounds:
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W#6538 | The following table gives some general recommendations for configuring Change. For the best results, start with these figures and refine them through experimentation.
Under some circumstances, all sessions in the session pool may be busy and thus unavailable to satisfy a new user request. In particular, running many reports can tie up back-end sessions and prevent other requests from being satisfied. When this happens, the user will see the message "Failed to get a session: Exceeded retry limit," which is usually indicative of a server configuration issue. To alleviate this problem, try one or more of the following:
Out of the box, Change has a maximum heap size setting sufficient to support about 200 active users (each making a request every 5-10 minutes) under normal usage patterns. If the web server process exceeds this threshold, performance may degrade. Periodically check the size of this process, and if it exceeds the maximum heap size threshold, change that threshold to a more appropriate number based on experimentation. Changing the Java maximum heap size for Change on Jetty:
2. Edit CHANGE_HOME\jetty\win32\change.cfg. Search for the Java maximum heap size flag, "-Xmx", and increase the value to a number more suitable to your needs. 3. Remove and reinstall the service: CHANGE_HOME\jetty\service.bat /remove CHANGE_HOME\jetty\service.bat /install 4. Start Change.
2. Edit CHANGE_HOME/cs_app/bin/jetty.sh. Search for the Java maximum heap size flag, "-Xmx", and increase the value to a number more suitable to your needs. 3. Start Change. For details on setting the Java memory settings for an application server, consult your application server documentation. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#6570 | When multiple hosts are used by Change, all system clocks must be synchronized. Otherwise, the modify times on CRs can be incorrect, causing the server to falsely alert users that the CR has been modified by someone else. One manifestation of this problem is failure of the bulk transition feature: "Transition failed... CR <crid> has been modified by another user, please reload your view." | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7263 | Attachments may fail to be DCM transferred. DCM only transfers objects in static states. Some attachments may be in the non-static 'public' state and thus are not DCM tranferred. Database upgrade attempts to correct this, but may fail for attachments that are missing required attributes. Workaround: This must be resolved manually for each affected database. 1. Remove required attributes from attachment objects. Ensure that "Verify Connect Existence on Promote/Check In" is disabled for the 'binary' cvtype. Similarly, ensure the 'binary' cvtype has no other required attributes. Restart your Synergy session. Restart Change if necessary. 2. Transition attachments to the 'readonly' state. Run the following commands as the CM administrator: ccm query "has_attr('attachment_name') and status='public' and not has_attr('doorsID')" ccm ci -state readonly -nocomment @ | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7288 | Using the Synergy integration in a heterogenous UNIX enviroment has the requirement that CCM_HOME, as defined in web.xml, must be same on all platforms. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7329 | Error messages and their resolutions:
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W#7334 | E-Signature limitations:
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W#7336 | CR process customization limitations: 1. The following attributes cannot be changed: problem_number, problem_synopsis, transition_log, and modify_user. 2. The COPY state name is reserved for the copy function and cannot be used for other purposes. 3. The name of an attribute cannot be a JavaScript reserved word (e.g., if, for, case, class, super, etc.), a global property/method name on the Window object (e.g., alert, document, location, self, etc.), or any other global object in the browser context (e.g., escape, Math, etc.). 4. The name of an attribute cannot be a Synergy reserved keyword (e.g., purpose). 5. The name of a state or attribute cannot be greater than 32 characters. 6. The following fields should be alphanumeric strings beginning with a letter:
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W#7340 | Back-end session start-up fails if ui_database_dir is set. The Synergy database path must be visible to all back-end Synergy sessions, and the ui_database_dir parameter must not be specified in the ccm.ini file. If the ui_database_dir parameter is set, back-end Synergy sessions might fail to start properly and you might see a message similar to the following: Ccm Start Failed Warning: ACcent execution aborted in 'lscmds:status' | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7341 | Notify trigger limitations:
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W#7478 | When object source is downloaded, the character encoding is that which is stored in the database. In particular, no character encoding translation is done. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7645 | Several unused methods have been removed from the apiObjectData object in the Perl API: 1. setReadOnly 2. setRequired 3. setInherited 4. setDefault In addition, the setValue method has been changed to accept time in seconds like its counterpart getter method. This has been done to remove the inconsistency between set and get methods. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7838 | The "View Source" functionality of IE 6 sometimes fails to work on pages that are compressed. There are two workarounds: 1. Use Firefox instead, as it does not suffer from this problem 2. Disable HTTP compression in the web.xml file. This is done by commenting out the following lines: <!-- <filter> <filter-name>CompressingFilter</filter-name> <filter-class>com.planetj.servlet.filter.compression.CompressingFilter</filter-class> <init-param> <param-name>excludeContentTypes</param-name> <param-value>application/zip,application/x-zip-compressed,application/x-gzip</param-value> </init-param> </filter> <filter-mapping> <filter-name>CompressingFilter</filter-name> <url-pattern>/*</url-pattern> </filter-mapping> --> | ||||||||||||||||||
W#7931 | Saving a report with a chart doesn't necessarily preserve the chart. This is because the chart is now an image (as opposed to an applet). You must save the complete web page (not just the HTML source), including the chart image files, for the report to display properly. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#8221 | The admin audit log, CHANGE_APP_HOME/logs/audit_log.xml, may become large as it grows indefinitely. Since it is infrequently updated, this is not normally an issue, but if it grows too large it may need to be archived and then cleared. This can be done two ways: 1. Move audit_log.xml directly from the file system to the appropriate back-up location. The drawback with this approach is that audit_log.xml is not a well-formed XML document as it does not have a root node. This will prevent it from loading in XML tools. 2. From the General tab of the Administration dialog, click Download in the Admin Audit Log groupbox. Save the XML file off to the desired back-up location. Then delete audit_log.xml from the file system. This is the recommended methodology. If missing from the install area, audit_log.xml will be re-created the next time something needs to be logged. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#8585 | The Perl API CreateUserSecurityData is obsolete and will be removed in a future release. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#8806 | Central server mode has the following DCM limitations:
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W#8852 | The Synergy admin user must be explicitly listed in the database in order to log into Change as that user. By default, this user is implicitly in the database, and thus not listed by ccm users. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#8869 | The Synergy integration, which allows Synergy dialogs to be launched from Change, has the following constraints in central server mode:
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W#8977 | Steps to move/rename a central CR database: 1. Open pt.cfg. 2. Find the path specified by [CENTRAL_CR_DATABASE]. 3. Do a search and replace on this path, using the new path as the replacement. This should update one of the [CCM_DATABASE] entries, plus the [CENTRAL_CR_DATABASE] and [DEFAULT_DATABASE] entries. 4. Do a search and replace on the database path in pt_listbox.cfg (for database-specific listboxes) 5. Using the Perl API, do a search and replace on the database path in RDS (for preferencess) using the Perl API PreferenceNameSubstitutionForAllUsers. 6. Restart Change . | ||||||||||||||||||
W#9163 | The Synergy command to process e-mail submissions, ccm pt_process_submissions, should only be run on the central CR database, not development databases. | ||||||||||||||||||
W#9322 | As of Change 5.1, Perl scripts must be updated to use the executable "ratlperl" instead of "perl". This change does not affect triggers, which can use either. Additionally, the modules HTML::Template and Mail::Sender have been removed from Change. Users that were using these modules for sending email will have to update their scripts to use something else or manually download and install these modules. Also, the ChangeSynergy::EmailHelper module has been changed and isn't backwards compatible. | ||||||||||||||||||
M#12802 | DCS is not supported between Change 4.3 SP1 and subsequent releases if using e-signature attributes. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17169, R#39679 | Listbox dependencies are defined and values are saved in pt_listbox.cfg. If you change a dependency in the CR process file (XML), pt_listbox.cfg (in the wsconfig directory) will have the old dependency and will cause a configuration error. To preserve the dependency, define parent and child attributes together in the process package before installing the package and then define the values. If an attribute is already defined for which you want to create a child attribute, you must move pt_listbox.cfg into a package template (thus ensuring there is no pt_listbox.cfg in the wsconfig directory), delete the references to parent attribute from pt_listbox.cfg, create the child attribute, recreate the process package using that package template, reinstall the process package and then define the listbox values. Defining a child attribute to a parent attribute which has no values defined yet always works. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17362 | The Synergy session user consumes a Synergy license. To compensate, licenses generated for Synergy always include one more Synergy license than originally ordered. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17434 | IP address vs. hostname URL configuration Change can be configured to use IP addresses, fully qualified domain names, or relative paths when generating URLs. This feature has been added for situations where using the hostname alone may cause problems with name resolution. For example, if the server name is eagle, the hostname URL would begin with http://eagle:8600/central. Note: After switching between hostname and IP address URLs, users must delete their Change cookies, otherwise transition and report links will not work. 1. Stop Change. 2. Determine the desired way to generate links in CHANGE_APP_HOME/WEB_INF/wsconfig/pt.cfg: absolute or relative. # # How links should be generated (absolute or relative) # [CCM_SYSTEM][GENERATED_LINKS]absolute[/GENERATED_LINKS][/CCM_SYSTEM] If you chose relative, proceed to step 4. 3. Determine the desired way to show the host. a) To use the short hostname or IP address, edit the entry below in CHANGE_APP_HOME/WEB_INF/wsconfig/pt.cfg: # # How to refer to the host (hostname or ipaddress) # [CCM_SYSTEM][DEFAULT_HOST_TYPE]ipaddress[/DEFAULT_HOST_TYPE][/CCM_SYSTEM] b) To use a custom hostname format (e.g., to use a fully qualified domain name or a different IP address), make the changes in red to CHANGE_APP_HOME/WEB-INF/web.xml: <context-param> <param-name>port</param-name> <param-value>5000</param-value> </context-param> <context-param> <param-name>hostname</param-name> <param-value>(hostname override)</param-value> </context-param> 4. Delete the file CHANGE_APP_HOME/WEB-INF/wsconfig/system/search.lock if it exists. 5. Restart Change. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17457 | Some Synergy session data is not re-initialized by re-loading configuration data. The following steps can be used to re-initialize these sessions for a database without restarting Change. From the Server tab: 1. Select target database. 2. Click Disabled radio button. 3. Save settings. 4. Window will be reloaded automatically. 5. Select target database. 6. Click Enabled radio button. 7. Save settings. All Synergy sessions serving the selected database will be restarted. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17461 | Creation of listbox dependencies can only be done from the Lifecycle Editor. New listbox dependencies cannot be created from the listbox manager interface. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17503 | User administration issues
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R#17524 | A Change Admin user will not be able to complete all administrative functions if he does not have the ccm_admin Synergy privilege in all Change databases. In particular, process packages cannot be installed and database privileges can only be seen/changed for databases in which the Admin user has the ccm_admin privilege. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#17692 | In general, you should navigate Change dialog boxes with the buttons and links provided. Avoid the browser's forward and back buttons (and their associated shortcuts, Alt + forward arrow and Alt + back arrow or Backspace, respectively), as script errors may result. However, there are times when using the forward/back commands is convenient; for example, to retrieve the lost content of a form, to undo accidental forward/back navigation, or to recover from a script error. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#29786 | Any data from an existing TDS server should be migrated to the new RDS server before connecting it to Change. Failure to do this may result in shared preferences/reports not being migrated. Workaound: Invoke the Perl script wsconfig/scripts/fixTdsForMigration.pl to remove the shared and admin preferences, and then re-attempt the migration. The following info is needed for running the script: 1. Server name 2. Port number 3. Admin login name 4. Admin's password 5. The database path | ||||||||||||||||||
R#30665 | The webserver automatically informs the browser of the correct character encoding. However, end users can explicitly change the character encoding the browser uses to display the page. Doing so, and subsequently submitting CR changes to the server, may result in data corruption because the characters sent don't match the expected encoding. | ||||||||||||||||||
R#32163 | Slow CR load times may result when using McAfee Anti-Virus and Internet Explorer together. This is because recent versions of McAfee Anti-Virus products actively scan scripts in Internet Explorer. Possible workarounds include disabling this feature in McAfee or using Firefox. |
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Document Information
Modified date:
17 June 2018
UID
swg27015941