IBM Rational Team Concert RTC and Subversion SVN Integration Tutorial:
In our earlier tutorials, we have seen the power of using IBM Rational Collaborative life cycle management (CLM) tool across the SDLC, thereby uniting the entire project team to work on a single repository.
IBM Rational Team Concert (RTC) is a part of IBM Rational CLM which provides the following features: Work Items, Agile Planning, Version Control, Build Management etc.
Table of Contents:
- Introduction
- Visual SVN Server
- Install Subversive Plugin to Eclipse
- Create a New Project and Share to SVN Source Control
- Share Project to SVN Repository
- Create Jazz SVN Connection
- Installing SVN Connector
- Link the Java Project Under SVN Control to the RTC Repository
- Commit Source Code to SVN Repository
- Show SVN History
- Conclusion
- Was this helpful?
- Recommended Reading
Introduction
RTC has a built-in version control feature, however, still, there could be users who are using Subversion as their primary version control tool. Hence, it does not make sense to move their entire source code immediately to RTC from Subversion.
Rather, just look to integrate RTC with Subversion and still maintain the traceability of the work items with the source code in Subversion along with the usage of other features of RTC.
This integration will provide the users using both Subversion and Rational Team Concert to collaborate effectively.
Subversion is a very popular open-source version control tool.
Two types of integration are supported in RTC:
- You can link subversion revisions to the TASK or Defect work items in RTC. For this, a Subversion client for Eclipse needs to be installed into the Eclipse along with the RTC P2 plugin for the integration to work.
- You can also import the source code contents of the Subversion repository into IBM Rational Team Concert repository by using the SVN Dump file.
In this tutorial, we will take an in-depth look at linking the RTC work items to subversion revisions using the subversion client for Eclipse.
Recommended Reading => IBM RTC Tutorial
Pre-Requisites
- Visual SVN server – Download
- TortoiseSVN 1.11.0 – Download
- IBM Rational Team Concert 6.0.x
- Eclipse Luna with RTC P2 plugin which can be downloaded from jazz.net site.
- Subversion client to Eclipse – Subversive plugin installed into Eclipse using the updated site
- Open internet connection to install the Subversion connector.
Visual SVN Server
Once the Visual SVN server is installed, create a repository and add users for access. For this integration, we are using a repository called JKE-SVN-Repository that is created with top-level branches, tags, and trunks.
Ensure that the users are also created.
Install Subversive Plugin to Eclipse
In Eclipse, go to Help => Install New Software and add the update site as described in the pre-requisites above to install the plugin.
Before we link the work items to Subversion revisions in Eclipse, we need to create any Java project or use an existing project and share to the SVN source control repository.
Java project is created. Create package and java class files.
Right-click on the Java Project that is just created and select Team => Share Project.
Select SVN and click Next.
Select the option Create a new repository location and click Next. We need to enter the repository URL that is created with the VisualSVN server as shown above.
Enter the trunk location which is typically the main development area, using the IP address of the Subversion repository machine in the url of the SVN server.
Click Next twice and click on Finish.
IBM Rational Team Concert (RTC) repository connected
Also, ensure that RTC P2 plugin is installed and the project area is connected and seen in the Team Artifacts view.
Sample Task Work item
Let’s create a sample Task work item which will be used to link to the Subversion commits in the RTC project. Kindly note that the Task ID is 90.
Create Jazz SVN Connection
In Eclipse, go to the Jazz SVN Connection view and create a new SVN connection.
As shown below, enter the URL of the SVN repository using the IP Address and not the hostname.
Right-click on the connection and select Update Links. Click Yes to proceed.
Installing SVN Connector
A SVN connector needs to be installed, else the integration will not work. To install the connector in Eclipse, go to Windows => Preferences => Team => SVN. Go to the SVN Connector TAB and click on the Get Connectors.
Select and Install SVN Kit as shown below.
Link the Java Project Under SVN Control to the RTC Repository
The link created using the below procedure will help to connect Subversion revisions to the RTC work items. Right-click on the Java project and select Properties.
Select the property named Jazz Work Items as shown below. The work item repository shown is the same as that which is shown in the Team Artifacts view above.
Click on Apply and OK.
Commit Source Code to SVN Repository
Right-click on the Java project and select Team => Commit.
Enter the work item number (E.g. 90 in this case) on TOP as shown in the below image and click OK.
In IBM Rational Team Concert, open the work item (id: 90) and go to the Links TAB to look at the revisions.
Note: Once each and every change is made to the source code and after committing the changes, make sure to right-click on the SVN connection and select Update links to update the same in the RTC Work Item links TAB.
Show SVN History
In the RTC work items Links Tab, double click on the specific revision to view the changes.
For Example, double click on Revision 5 and that will open up the SVN history for the file.
Double-clicking on the file will show the changes for that specific revision.
Any further changes to the files and proceeding to commit the changes will ask for the RTC work item number. This establishes the traceability between the RTC work items and the Subversion revisions that are much similar to the way in which one would work with the RTC source control repository.
Conclusion
In today’s world, software development demands transparency in all aspects of the process with respect to tracking changes. Thus traceability helps to ensure that the software which is delivered complies with that of the customer requirements.
From a SDLC perspective through traceability, a business analyst knows that development is going on and test cases are defined too. Similarly, it also provides a context for the development team to build the right application by looking at the requirements.
Traceability is a very important aspect right from Requirements. In this article, we have seen how the IBM Rational Team Concert (RTC) integrates with Subversion by providing transparency from the work item to the source code.
Though we have seen how RTC integrates with Subversion, it is also possible to migrate the Subversion code into RTC. Thus this integration that is showcased, helps the subversion users to take advantage of the other RTC features of work items, planning and build management.