ClearTrack(TM) Change Request Management System
ClearTrack is Atria's customizable change request management (CRM) system that
tracks defects and enhancement requests throughout the entire software
lifecycle. It is a highly customizable client/server product that includes a
turnkey change request management application and embedded database so that all
users within a software engineering team can quickly start submitting, tracking
and managing change requests.
Change requests, which include both defects and enhancement requests, impact
all groups within a software engineering team. ClearTrack controls the
migration of change requests through the entire software lifecycle, and is
designed for deployment and use by all members of a software engineering team,
including:
- development engineers/managers
- QA engineers/managers
- release engineers/managers
- project managers
- technical support engineers/managers
With ClearTrack, everyone in the software engineering organization can easily
access and act on the same lifecycle information, improving the team's overall
performance.
ClearTrack can be used both as a standalone system and in conjunction with
Atria's ClearCase, a leading Software Configuration Management (SCM) product
for team-based development. Change Management is the integrated combination of
SCM and CRM. ClearCase and ClearTrack used together provide an effective and
comprehensive single-vendor Change Management solution to fully control the
entire software development and maintenance process.
ClearTrack is based on technology acquired from Silicon Graphics, Inc. Atria
Software owns full rights to this technology and has added significant
enhancements to effectively address change request management needs in software
development and maintenance environments.
An effective change request management system needs to provide the following
capabilities:
- Capture important data to describe a defects or enhancement request,
including who submitted the request, what project is it associated with, who is
assigned to address the request and other information needed to track the
request;
- Provide easy access to information used in managing workflow, through the use
of queries and textual and graphical reports;
- Implement a user interface that allows engineers, technical support staff and
managers to easily enter, find and report on change requests; and
- Institute a flexible and workable process model that can be used to enforce
desired development and maintenance policies.
ClearTrack addresses these needs by including a fully featured, turnkey
change request management application for quick implementation, plus
the ability to extensively customize this application or create a
new change request application for specialized requirements and processes. An
embedded, scalable database is included for reliability, and
conversion examples are also included to simplify the migration
of data from existing defect-tracking applications to ClearTrack.
ClearTrack includes a fully defined turnkey application that allows customers
to implement and deploy change request management quickly, with little or no
modification. The key functionality provided by the turnkey application
includes:
- Pre-defined states and transitions for change request management
- Pre-defined queries and reports
- Intuitive graphical user interface
- Integration with ClearCase software configuration management
- Email submission
- Attachments to change requests
All these capabilities can be tailored for specific software engineering team
requirements.
ClearTrack controls the migration of a change request through its
lifecycle. It provides a pre-defined collection of change request
states (for example, "Assigned" or "Resolved"), and the
transitions that are allowed as a change requests moves from one state
to another. Actions (for example, email notification) and rules
that govern the lifecycle are also provided.
The following diagram shows a portion of the change request lifecycle provided
with ClearTrack.
Here is an example of how a change request can move through the
lifecycle:
A change request is submitted and then automatically or manually
assigned to an owner. Email can be triggered to notify the owner
that a change request has been assigned. The owner then decides is this
request has been previously submitted (duplicate) or is not a valid
request (rejected). If accepted, the request is scheduled for
work by the owner, who fixes the change request. The request then transitions
to the resolved state.
Querying and report generation are two critical areas for an
effective change request management system. A set of pre-defined queries and
reports are provided with ClearTrack to assist in quick implementation.
ClearTrack also supports intuitive "query by form", where queries can be
entered by selecting fields shown in the graphical user interface, instead of
typing long lists of cryptic query commands. User-defined queries can be saved
and re-used. Query results can also be sorted by the user's search criteria,
presenting the results in the exact format desired.
The pre-defined reports give users a headstart on gathering project metrics.
Change request information can easily be grouped, and summary information such
as subtotals and totals can be included in ClearTrack reports, giving users
the exact information they need. These reports contain both textual and
graphical information, and can be previewed onscreen to ensure accuracy before
printing.
Report templates are also provided for users to create their own reports and
formats. The templates give users an easy and straightforward way to customize
data gathering and reporting for specific requirements and formats. Shell
scripts can also be used to generate reports in batch mode.
ClearTrack is designed for both occasional, novice users and
frequent, experienced users. ClearTrack provides an intuitive and flexible GUI
to ensure that all users can begin to enter, access and utilize their change
request information quickly and easily.
The main change request query screen has:
- summary information about all the requests that have matched a query,
including type, state, owner, request id and other summary information;
- detailed profile information about a specific request, including request id,
owner, date, status, request type, submitter, due date, etc.;
- description sections for input and viewing of text by the user that describes
and tracks the history of the request.
Popup menus are provided that contain values for specific fields to ensure
entries are valid. Extensive on-line help is included, and complete
documentation on the turnkey application as well as customization and
administration procedures is provided.
The turnkey application includes a tight integration with
ClearCase. The integration is an effective process control mechanism to ensure
users have accurate information about what is changing or has changed with
their software and why.
The key features that the integration adds are:
- Creating and controlling "Work in Process" and "Fixes" attributes for
ClearCase-controlled elements
- Tracking the status of ClearCase elements based on these attributes
- Automatic updating of both ClearCase and ClearTrack databases as change
requests transition between states
- A customizable policies file to ensure that the right level of process
control is being enforced
ClearCase and ClearTrack together provide an extremely effective Change
Management solution for team-based software development and maintenance from a
single vendor.
ClearTrack allows users to submit change requests to the database
via email, providing greater flexibililty for remote access. Email access also
permits other important applications such as call tracking and software testing
to automatically integrate their output into ClearTrack. For example, customer
support engineers using a call tracking product can enter change requests once
through their call tracking product and the ClearTrack database will
automatically be updated, improving the support engineers' productivity.
Attachments to change requests, including sample output, core
dumps, and bit maps can be included to provide more detailed information.
One of the key strengths of ClearTrack is that it can be extensively tuned to
meet the specific needs of an organization. Users can tailor reports, queries,
and the ClearCase integration to obtain the specific information they need.
ClearTrack includes a Process Description Language to customize all aspects of
the change request lifecycle (states, transitions, actions and rules), fields
in the embedded database and user interface layout to reflect an organization's
requirements.
Complete customization information is included with the standard ClearTrack
documentation. Atria also offers consulting services to assist in customizing
ClearTrack to the organization's development process.
ClearTrack includes an embedded, transaction-oriented database to ensure high
performance for change request management. ClearTrack's database is designed
to support increasing amounts of data and growing numbers of users.
ClearTrack includes examples to help customers currently using other
defect-tracking tools to effectively convert their data to ClearTrack.
ClearTrack 1.0 is supported on the following platforms:
- HP-UX 9.0.5 for HP 9000/700, HP-UX 9.0.4 for HP 9000/800
- SGI IRIX 5.2 and 5.3
- Solaris 2.3 and 2.4
- SunOS 4.1.3 and 4.1.4
Client systems: 16-32 MB RAM, 400 MB disk
Server systems: 64-128 MB RAM, 2 GB disk
Integration with ClearCase: ClearCase 2.1 or later is recommended.
ClearTrack is available as a bundled solution with ClearCase, or as a
standalone change request management system.
ClearTrack is licensed on a per-user basis. ClearTrack licenses start at $795
US list. ClearCase/ClearTrack bundle licenses start at $4595 US list.
Quantity discounts and maintenance are available.
ClearTrack will be available in the first quarter of 1996.
For more information on ClearTrack, please contact
your local Atria
Software Sales Executive, or contact Atria
Software at (617) 676-2400; fax (617) 676-2410; e-mail
info@atria.com. Or fill out this
form.
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