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Add a Document Attribute to Items

It is often helpful to be able to store document(s) inside items in a Cradle database.

This is easy to set up. You simply add one or more new document ‘frame’ attribute(s) to the type of item in which you want to store documents, such as your test cases, or your System Breakdown Structure (SBS). To do this:

1. Start WorkBench and login to your database as a user with PROJECT privilege so you can change the schema
2. Select ‘Project Setup’ from the ‘Project’ tab to open the schema
3. With ‘Options’ set to ‘Item Definitions’, select the ‘Item’ type (this is the default)
4. Select the item type and select ‘Frames…’
5. Select ‘New…’ and enter the name of the new image attribute, such as: document
6. Set the new attribute’s frame type to be WORD (DOCX) or OO WRITER that are provided with all Cradle systems. With no frame type, the frame stores plain text.
7. Select ‘OK’ to close the schema

Now any/all items of your chosen item type can have a document frame that can contain a Word document (for WORD (DOCX) frames) or a LibreOffice/Open Office document (for OO WRITER frames). The entire document is embedded inside the item’s attribute.

When you view the attribute, it will appear as <DATA>. If you select View or Edit for this attribute, then it will open in Word or Writer. If you chose Edit, then any changes that you made to the document will be saved back into the database.

You can capture tables or images or ranges of text from external Word documents into the attribute using Document Loader. You can include these Word documents in reports and in documents published by Document Publisher. If you edit the document, then the change history will store the documents from before and after each edit.

Add a Document Attribute to Items

Article Updated 04/02/2019 – Increased image size to make it readable
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Opening an External URL reference from a Form

Referenced Information

Sometimes you need to reference an external resource from an item. These external references can be easily achieved by adding  a URL frame to a Cradle item type. Each instance of that item type can then hold a reference to an external resource. The URL can then be opened to view it from the link element in the form.

Creating a URL Frame

While the ability to reference external resources via URL in a form is useful, you must first assign the HTML frame type to your Item Type(s).

It is very easy to do this, simply open Project Setup > Go to Item Types > Select your desired Item Type and click “Frames”. From here, create a new frame and then from the Type drop down select “HTML”.

Screenshot showing how to assign a frame
Assigning a Frame

We hope you find this useful! For information on other useful frame types see this cradle help article.

Article Updated 30/01/2019 – Added extra information

 

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Avoid Problems Opening Source Documents and Statements

Avoid Problems Opening Source Documents and Statements

You can capture information from Word documents into items in a Cradle database. The items are linked to the ‘source statements’ inside the document. You can follow a link from the item to the paragraph, table, or table row or cell that is the origin of the requirement. When you do this, Word will open to show the source document, correctly positioned to show the source statement.

If you see an error about a command, such as EditGoTo not being available as the document is read-only, then you need to clear the ‘open e-mail attachments read-only’ setting in Word, as shown in the figure.

We hope that this helps!

Avoid Problems Opening Statements
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Contents of a Cradle database

Each Cradle database contains different sets of information. These can be imagined as layers, where each layer uses the data in the layers below it. For example, cross references cannot exist until the items exist whose relationships are shown by the cross reference. These layers are, highest to lowest:

1. Cross references – the links between the data
2. Items – the data
3. Definitions – how to find, view and report the data
4. User profiles – who can own and access the data
5. Schema – the structure of the data
Cradle database layers
You can export/import each layer individually, or in any combination, or all layers. You should only import a layer of information if the lower layers already exist in the database (unless you know that it is safe).

To initialise a new database from an existing database, you need as a minimum:

– The schema
– Definitions

User profiles are needed to use a database and may be needed for some parts of the schema (such as workflows and alerts) and definitions (user and personal scopes).

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Single User to Enterprise Conversion

Project Grown?

Has your project grown? Is it too big for a single user? Do you need to work in an enterprise environment?

When you first start with a project you may just need one person working away at the initial Requirements (single-user environment). However, when more stakeholders, designers, reviewers and managers join (an enterprise environment) the installation needs to grow.

The good news is that in Cradle this is simply a reconfiguration of your Cradle licence for an Enterprise version and then you can all carry on with the same project.

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Linux or Windows

Spot the difference

Cradle is supported on whichever platform your business uses. Cradle WorkBench will run on Linux/Windows  Cradle Database Server (CDS) is equally at home on a Linux or Windows box. Of course Web Access is available wherever you browser runs. As you can see from the screenshots there is no need for users to learn a new UI between versions.

Screenshots in Linux and Windows
Windows or Linux

Convert Later?

Yes absolutely you can convert between versions. That’s great news for your IT department, if they decide to change the server machine they’ll need to port the data across to the new installation and then chat to salesdetails@threesl.com to obtain a new licence.

Continue reading “Linux or Windows”

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Linked Items in a Form

Seeing other linked items

When you want to see the other items that are linked to the current item in a Cradle display, you can do so by showing the linked items in a Form. This is an effective way to get a comprehensive overview of the interconnections in a formatted and repeatable way.

Linked items shown in a form
Items that are linked to the current item

You can find more information on setting up a form to display this links in this Cradle help article.

Alternatives

You can see items that are linked to the subject item in a number of different ways including:

  • Configure a View to show a linked items column
  • Use the right click context menu and select  Show  Linked  Items
  • Double click the item in a Table View to expand extra rows
  • Follow the [+] expansions in a tree view

The View method is as repeatable as setting in a form, the other methods are transient.

Article updated 05/12/2018 – Added link to Cradle help
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Clear Requirements

The Problem

The teacher, or your customer, envisages a house built on a hill, they see this as their requirements. In their mind they understand what they want, they have an inherent understanding of how a house should be oriented.

The pupil,  or supplier, may not have the same inherent understanding and this can disappoint the customer.

House 'on' in the loose sense, a hill
Requirement for a house ‘on’ a hill

The Managed Requirements Solution

Managing requirements, managing expectations, ensuring clear and unambiguous understanding creates a successful project and a happy customer.

Furthermore, following a defined process of elicitation, discussion, refinement and validation will ensure all parties are kept in the picture throughout the process. There should be no surprises.

The stages can be generalised as:

  • recording the Customer requirements (what the teacher said);
  • connecting these to System Requirements (what the pupil thinks is the right way to place a house on the hill);
  • reviewing and verifying with the customer that all is clear and understood (the teacher has a chance to see that the relative orientation has not been considered);
  • correction and update;
  • build and validate;
  • Happy customer!

Equally we live in the real world and thing need and do change. A process needs to cope with and manage those changes. These may be customer initiated, corrections as part of the refinement and understanding stage, or external influences.

Control and Managing Change

This could be through a set of documents, but this is not very scalable. The more complex and numerous the requirements, the more difficult it is to manage the inter dependencies between different parts of the document set.

Imagine the simple case in our example:

  • “The foundations shall comply with building regulation ABC”.

It is easy enough to imagine one chapter with some dimensions for the foundations and one building regulation document.

Remaining with the simplistic house:

  • “Kitchen wiring shall provide one outlet for each of the 12 appliances in accordance with regulation GHI(i)”,
  • “Lounge wiring shall provide a multiple in window bay and one outlet in each of the other corners in accordance with regulation GHI(i)”,
  • “Bedroom 1 shall provide one outlet in each corner of the room in accordance with regulation GHI(i)”,
  • “Bedroom2….”

It is still possible to get your head round the interconnects. It will be a bit more time consuming when GHI(i) is up-released to GHI(ii) and building work hasn’t started and you have to check all the items ordered for the socket outlets still comply in each room.

Conclusion

With a small scale step the complexity the above can soon become unmanageable. Our house may only have seven rooms, but what if these were tens of different compartments on a submarine, hundreds shops owned by a national retailer? GHI(ii)- sub section ‘Public accessible spaces’ is upgraded after a regulatory consultation. How many room specifications are affected?

In a managed solution, a simple report on elements dependent on GHI will give a quick way of calculating the cost impact of altering all the specified outlets. If the power outlets had been categorised when the requirements were written with say Public / Employee / Private access, the number affected, and thus the impact to your customer, could have been further refined.

Article Updated 30/01/2019 – Updated formatting

 

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Make a Hierarchy Diagram (HID)

What is a Hierarchy Diagram (HID)?

A Hierarchy Diagram (HID) is a diagram style that is used to graphically show cross references between items. A HID is a tree that starts with the item of interest (source item) and shows the items that are linked to it by cross references. Each of these items’ cross references can be shown with their cross referenced items.

What’s linked to what?

Generate a HID (Hierarchy Diagram) in Cradle for a clear graphical representation of how your items interconnect. Simple to see what depends on what at many levels.

 

Hierarchy Diagram Options and Information

When a HID is opened, the Control sidebar is refreshed to show the following tabs:

  • Starmap – Is a highly zoomed view of the diagram.
Starmap
Starmap
  • From Item – Shows details of the from item.
From Item
From Item
  • Hierarchy – Ability to define a hierarchy and set the links to follow for each item type.
Hierarchy
Hierarchy
  • Diagram Summary Information – Shows the number of items, cross references, levels and symbols in the current HID.
Diagram Summary
Diagram Summary

If you would like more information on Hierarchy Diagrams and how you can use them, you may find this Cradle help article useful.

Article Updtaed29/01/2019 –  Added more information and examples