Articles

Jama Performance In Enterprise Recommendations for System Administrators

By Preston posted 05-02-2019
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Introduction   Jama Connect is a platform that is successfully used at scale for many different use scenarios. By design, Jama Connect can be configured and used in many ways. The fact that the platform is so configurable makes it difficult to provide “hard” guardrails and performance recommendations. Instead, the purpose of this document is to:   d efine  “ typical ” usage profile of Jama Connect p rovide a matrix  where performance  may be affected during specific usage scenarios   provide recommendations to mitigate performance  risks   Assumptions:   This article assumes your Jama Connect instance is in our hosted ...
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How to fix the User Login and Visual Utilization Reports

By Dana posted 04-29-2019
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The User Login Report and the Visual Utilization Report have been updated on our Community-Reports repo on Github .  To apply these updates you can upload the new reports from Github or manually fix them by following the steps below. There is a known issue where BIRT reports that include charts will fail when attempting to open with MS Word due to a library dependency that is not compatible with recent Java updates. The reports are still accessible when viewed with the HTML option. The embedded version of BIRT, which is the SQL reporting engine included in Jama Connect, requires a feature that was deprecated in Java 4 and was not included in the ...
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Editing the file attachments whitelist in Jama Connect 2015.5 and older

By Jason posted 04-24-2019
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For our self-hosted customers that use any Jama Connect 8.X, adding a file type to the attachments whitelist is as easy as logging in as the root user and editing the list under System Properties.  For our customers that are hosting their own Jama Connect version 2015.5 or older, it’s a bit more involved. You’ll need to edit the contour-service-attachment.xml file. To do this you’ll need to:  Stop the Tomcat server  systemctl stop tomcat Take a backup of contour-service-attachment.xml, located on the application server in  {tomcat_home} > webapps > contour > WEB-INF > classes > context . Search for the following line: <bean ...
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Performance Testing and Planning: Community Deep Dive

By Chloe posted 04-15-2019
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Welcome to our first Community Deep Dive Webinar, April 17, 2019 at 7:00am PST, today's topic is: Performance Testing & Planning   What is the Jama Quality Assurance testing process? Under what circumstances should you write your own tests? What are some tips for writing tests? How to measure your results? How can Enterprise Elite and Essentials benefit you? Performance Testing & Planning This is a YouTube live event from Jama Software headquarters. We will be monitoring this page and taking questions during the live event (April 17th at 7:00am PST). To participate:  make sure you are logged into the ...
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Jama Connect Performance Whitepaper

By Michael posted 04-12-2019
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Performance Planning for Self-Hosted Implementations of Jama Connect Overview This article provides information about internal testing practices at Jama Software as well as insights into how Jama Connect self-hosted customers can be successful scaling and testing in their own environments. We will list factors that should be considered and provide both best practices and troubleshooting tips.   If you are using Jama Connect Cloud (our SaaS-based solution) then you are already in an environment where we work to monitor and maintain optimal performance. If you are currently self-hosted and want more information about our SaaS offering, please talk with ...
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Opshub OIM Release Notes

By Chloe posted 04-08-2019
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Opshub OIM v7.22 Please contact Jama Support for assistance updating to the latest version of SelfHosted OIM. Cloud users will be updated to the latest version quarterly, timing must be scheduled. Older version release notes can be found here:   docs.myopshub.com Select the appropriate version in the top right of the Opshub Doc repository.   OIM v7.22 New Connectors, Versions, and Entities Added support for Jira version 8.2.2 Enhancements Upgraded 5 third party libraries OpsHub Integration Manager is using, to the latest version available. Enhanced recovery strategy to avoid extra processing for recovery ...
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Come to our first Community Deep Dive Live Webinar!

By Chloe posted 04-08-2019
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About this Community Deep Dive Webinar As practitioners of Jama Software, you know the benefits of using specialized software which aligns your industry professionals and requirements to develop complex products, systems and software. It is important to have the most updated version of Jama Software to maintain full performance capability in attaining your company goals. We'd like to share our pre-release testing process as well as cover scenarios you may need to test. This Community Deep Dive will be a live event from Jama Software headquarters on April 17, 2019, 7am PST. How you can participate: Here is a direct link for this webinar on ...
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Polling, Concurrency, Scan Frequency Guidelines for Tasktop and Opshub

By Jason posted 04-04-2019
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Polling, Concurrency, Scan Frequency Guidelines for Tasktop and Opshub Jama currently works directly with Tasktop and Opshub for Data Federation services. Improper Polling and scan settings can have detrimental impact to service use. If you work with another vendor and would like to share your settings in this central area, please let us know. Tasktop Recommended Configuration: Our recommendations are based on the 19.1 Tasktop Settings. Details:  https://docs.tasktop.com/tasktop/user-guide/settings Change Detection Polling Interval Recommended setting: 1 minute Full Scan Change Detection Polling Interval Recommend setting: at-least 24 hours ...
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Admin Panels and their functions

By Jason posted 03-25-2019
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For our self-hosted customers, Jama Connect has a few Admin panels for configuring and administrating different parts of Jama Connect. Their names are very similar, and it can be confusing as to which one does what. Hopefully this article will clear some things up and give you an understanding of the functionality of each of these panels.   Jama Connect Admin Console Let’s start with the Jama Connect Admin console. The Admin Console is used only by our self-hosted customers. It is mostly used by system administrators to set up the server, database, and license settings. To get to the admin console, open a browser and go to <Your Base URL>:8800. ...
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Preparing for SAML Enablement on the Cloud

By Kimberly posted 03-18-2019
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In order to set up SAML, your company must have a  SAML 2.0 compliant  Identity Provider (IdP) and a technical person, often an IT Administrator, who can provide your  Identity Provider’s metadata URL . This person is a key figure to the configuration and must be identified prior to engaging Jama Software as they may need access to Jama Connect for testing purposes. In addition to the above, there are a few caveats you should be aware of when using our SAML implementation.   Please review everything below with your IT Administrator: Jama supports SAML 2.0 compliant Identity Providers (IdPs.) We currently only support SP-initiated (Service Provider ...
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Jama Software Response to BIRT Report Defect: SOS-DEF-4056

By Chloe posted 03-12-2019
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The Issue: BIRT reports with embedded charts/images/tables will fail when attempting to export to Microsoft Word format. While working in Jama, the actions of: Go to Reports > Select (BIRT report with images) > Select Word Format > Run ; will result with the error message of: “ An error occurred while rendering a report ”. Root Cause Analysis (RCA): The root of the problem lies with the images within the BIRT reports. The embedded version of BIRT, which is the SQL reporting engine included in Jama Connect, requires a feature that was deprecated in Java 4 and was not included in the OpenJDK8 delivered with Jama Connect 8.31.2. We ...
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Pattern: Overview

By Michael posted 03-08-2019
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What are Patterns? Initially developed by architect Christopher Alexander as a ”language to describe common architectural problems and their solutions". Adapted in Software Engineering (Design Patterns) to capture “Elements of Reusable Object Oriented Software”. Ever since, pattern languages have been developed for many fields. Great way for capturing best practices without having to worry about their interplay initially. Sometimes, the term "best practice" is used as well. What are Product Development Patterns? Product development patterns are intended to pragmatically (1) address issues with product development, or (2) apply them for continuous ...
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Pattern: Define Workflows

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Make it easy and intuitive for stakeholders to follow your processes by supporting them with workflows Also Known as One Motivation Your processes are important, at the same time you want to leave your users enough freedom to be creative and productive. Well-designed workflows are a way to realize this. While the process typically exists on paper, the workflow guides you through your daily activities. Applicability Use the pattern when: You have processes that need to adhered to, e.g. for regulatory reasons Your product description is complex, so you want to add guidance Structure A workflow is typically supported by tooling. ...
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Pattern: Interfaces

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Be explicit about identifying and documenting interfaces Motivation As the complexity of products grows, we need robust decomposition (see Black Box ). This in turn requires stability in the interfaces. That's why interfaces need special attention. Having the right interfaces in the right places can make a huge difference in being able to react to changes, robustness and flexibility. Interfaces exist on many levels: It can be about connecting two physical components. It can be about consuming software libraries. It can be about a combination of hardware and software (e.g. a USB connection). It can be about talking to machines or humans. The key ...
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Pattern: Behavior/Test Driven Development (BDD)

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Look at the accepted product, passed test, etc. first, before thinking about the product descriptions, requirements or design. Also Known as Test-Driven Development (TDD) Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) Acceptance Test-Driven Development (ATDD) Motivation All these "-Driven Development" approaches have one thing in common: You first define what it means to be successful, before defining what it actually is what you want to build. TDD has worked really well in software development, where developers wrote first the test (which would initially fail), to then write the implementation that would make the test pass. A nice side effect was ...
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Pattern: Consistency Criteria

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Understand the state of your development by establishing and regularly evaluating consistency criteria Also Known as Coverage Invariants Motivation Typically, product development takes place in a dedicated tool that uses an underlying data model. There is a lot of useful information in the model. Make sure that you use it. Coverage is a simple example: If you want to make sure that every stakeholder requirement is tested, then your consistency criteria would be: "every stakeholder requirement has at least one test". Make sure that you don't over-engineer these criteria, and then monitor them. Applicability Always use this pattern ...
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Pattern: Branch and Merge

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Avoid copy and paste. Also Known as Reuse Synchronization Motivation Copy and Paste is very easy, but in the long run, we regret it. Branching (and optionally merging) is an alternative that allows you to drastically reduce rework, thereby saving time and improving quality. Branching and merging has been state of the art in software development for 20 years, and it's time that we apply it to product development as well. Applicability Use the pattern: When you have standard content that you want to use in multiple places, and you want to periodically update it in all places You want to allow teams to work independently, but you ...
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Pattern: Evolve Hardware and Software Together

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent As more and more software ends up in products, evolving them together results in superior products Motivation Traditionally, either you first have some hardware and then you write the software – or the other way around. This used to work in the past, where a complex hardware (e.g. hydraulic system) had to be driven by software; or where some software required some hardware extensions (e.g. ticket printing machine). But today, customers expect amazing products where hardware and software are seamlessly integrated. This is only possible if they evolve together. The blog post Why The Demand For System Engineers Is So High also makes a good case ...
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Pattern: Functional Descriptions

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Functional thinking allows you decouple your product description from specific technologies. Motivation In order to "future-proof" your product, decouple technology from what your product actually does. For instance, your product may have a display. If you developed it 30 years ago, it probably had a cathode-ray tube, later an LCD display and maybe today an LED display. But the underlying function stayed the same. Applicability This pattern can be applied on many levels, from the stakeholder level ("The vehicle provides transportation"), to the lowest level (control engine torque). Of course, at some point you need to make specific technology ...
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Pattern: Good Requirements

By Michael posted 03-07-2019
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Intent Requirements are the foundation in product development. Getting them right can spare you a lot of trouble. Motivation The requirements text is an important building block of product descriptions. Unless they are well-written, we cannot use them as the foundation for our product development Applicability You should always make sure that your requirements have the desired quality. The approach may vary if your requirements are not simple text. Structure There is lots of literature on good requirements. Good textual descriptions are: Atomic Unambiguous No redundancy (in itself and with respect to other items) No contradiction (in ...
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