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LIGHTLY TECHNICAL OBSERVATIONS ON PEOPLESOFT, SQR, AND RELATED AND UNRELATED TOPICS

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Change Control in Application Designer

If you are the only developer for your PeopleSoft system, this item probably doesn't apply to you. For the rest of us, working in environments with other developers, change control is an important topic.

The term "change control" can refer to many things. Today I'm talking only about the control over physical changes to PeopleSoft objects. Application Designer includes a change control feature that can be enabled or disabled. This feature supports object locking, change history, and object stamping. Stamping refers to the user ID and timestamp information that is saved with each object when we change and save the object. This is always "on." The history feature stores basic change information and an optional comment entered by the developer. This can be useful documentation if it is used consistently. Today, though, I'd like to concentrate on the locking feature.

When multiple developers are working on multiple projects, it is easy to introduce bugs. One developer could change objects A and B while another developer modifies objects B and C. When the first project is migrated, objects A and B are copied to the next database. Now only half of the changes needed for the second project have been migrated. This can easily crash the system.

One solution is to lock each object before changing it. This is done "logically," not using the database's locking mechanism. Before changing an object you request a lock or reservation. If nobody else already has a lock on the object, you "own" it and can make your changes. You will then keep this lock until the object has been migrated (preferably all the way to production) or you decide to reverse your changes.

With locking enabled in App Designer, you can't modify an object unless you own the lock. Each time you open an object, App Designer will do one of three things. If you already have the lock, the object opens normally. If another person has the lock, a message box informs you of this and asks if you would like to open the object in read-only mode. (I'm not sure why you wouldn't.) If nobody has a lock on the object, a message box informs you of this and again asks if you would like to open the object in read-only mode. (Again, I'm not sure why not.) These messages are annoying but after a while you learn to dismiss them quickly.

This system applies to objects that can be modified in App Designer. Objects that cannot be modified in App Designer but can be attached to a project and "upgraded" (i.e., migrated using Upgrade|Copy) cannot be locked by a developer but can be locked by an administrator. Process definitions are an example of this type of object. I don't fully understand the logic behind this security restriction, but no matter—locking of these objects is generally less important anyway.

This system has a few unfortunate aspects. First, it is not always obvious when changes are or are not allowed. You could be typing changes into the PeopleCode editor only to find out that they cannot be saved. Even if you have the rights to save them, you sometimes cannot save them within the PeopleCode editor. For example, when changing Page PeopleCode, the "save" button does not become active until you close the editor and return to the page. This seems counterintuitive to me.

The biggest problem, though, relates to the "granularity" of what App Designer considers a lockable object. For example, to change one Component PeopleCode program, you are required to lock the entire component. A component could include dozens of PeopleCode objects. No other developer will be able to modify any of them while you have the component locked, even though it is easy to imagine cases in which this would be necessary. Since only the developer who has the lock, or the administrator, can release a lock, prepare to make many urgent calls to ask for locks to be dropped. Of course, that then defeats some of the purpose of the system. It is important for all developers to understand that a lock should be retained if possible until the object has been migrated. The purpose of a lock is not simply to prevent simultaneous changes. Locks should not be dropped without considering the possible effects. Of course, even though you might want to keep a lock, it is not always possible to do so due to the low granularity described above.

I wish that App Designer change control didn't have these limitations. Installations that have a product such as Quest Software's Stat! can use other locking mechanisms instead, although these may involve an element of "discipline" among developers to be effective.

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PS App Engine 04-30-2008
PS Commenting code 04-02-2008
PS The "Powered By" page 03-05-2008
PS Formats in PeopleCode vars 01-30-2008
PS Page layout with group boxes 01-09-2008
PS Meta-SQL wrappers 12-19-2007
PS Derived record PeopleCode 12-05-2007
PS A Cancel button 11-28-2007
General "Leading" the test effort 11-07-2007
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PS Migrating project definitions 09-26-2007
PS Derived records 09-19-2007
PS Positioning elements on pages 08-29-2007
General Thanks 08-22-2007
SQRSQR "code alerts" 08-08-2007
PS Styles in HTML Areas 08-01-2007
SQRDynamic SQL for performance? 07-25-2007
PS Page Field Name 07-18-2007
PS PeopleCode event order 06-27-2007
SQRFormatting Excel using HTML 06-06-2007
Component-changed state 05-23-2007
PS Selecting styles for page fields05-16-2007
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General Contractor networking 04-25-2007
PS Project X--and another project04-18-2007
PS Effective and data entry dates04-11-2007
PS A PeopleSoft home page 04-04-2007
PSSQRHyperion and the future of SQR03-21-2007
General The data doesn't lie 03-14-2007
PSSQRHyperion acquisition 03-07-2007
General Taking ownership 02-28-2007
PS Source control 02-21-2007
PS Sandboxes 02-14-2007
PS Migration instructions 02-07-2007
PS PeopleSoft environment usage 01-31-2007
PS Multiple environment strings 01-24-2007
PS Multiple testing environments 01-17-2007
PS PeopleSoft support environments 01-10-2007
General A single source of truth 01-03-2007
Nothing Smile 12-27-2006
PS Navigating the component buffer 12-20-2006
PS JavaScript and styles 12-13-2006
PS SQL for common HR queries 12-06-2006
SQRSQR program complexity 11-29-2006
SQRFrequent SQR questions 11-22-2006
PS Followup 11-15-2006
PS Expanding subrecords 11-08-2006
PS Bind variables 10-25-2006
PS Attaching objects to projects 10-18-2006
PS Partial transaction completion10-11-2006
PS The multi-process component 10-04-2006
PS Employee rows lost to security09-27-2006
SQRSQR document sections 09-20-2006
PS Empty-string compares in SQL 09-13-2006
SQRNulls, blanks, empty strings 09-06-2006
General Company policy 08-30-2006
PS Auto-lookup exclusion 08-23-2006
PS Effective status 08-16-2006
PS A couple of HRMS/HCM utilities08-02-2006
PS Translate value changes 07-26-2006
General Updating views 07-19-2006
General Set-based updates 07-12-2006
PS SQL set-based processing 07-05-2006
Being happy about bugs 06-28-2006
Busy in the PS marketplace 06-21-2006
General 2-way documentation 06-14-2006
PS Interfaces as views 06-07-2006
PS Hijacked fields 05-31-2006
General Agile software development 05-24-2006
General Working within Waterfall 05-17-2006
General Over the Waterfall 05-10-2006
PS Experimentation in PeopleSoft 05-03-2006
PS Unlimited enhancements? 04-26-2006
PS Testing direct DB updates 04-19-2006
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PS Database compares 04-05-2006
General Support problem? Call FBI! 03-29-2006
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PS Finding PeopleSoft Queries 03-15-2006
PS PeopleSoft Query support 03-08-2006
PS JOB table and SetIDs 03-01-2006
PS Migrating the project 02-22-2006
PS Compare and Report options 02-15-2006
PS Comparing and migrating projects 02-08-2006
PS Object security in App Designer 02-01-2006
PS Automation of App Designer 01-25-2006
General Contractors on PS projects 01-18-2006
General "Smart coding" 01-11-2006
SQRDebugger tricks 01-04-2006
PS EFFDT and component processing12-28-2005
PS Referential integrity 12-21-2005
PS Menu navigation using SQL 12-14-2005
SQRA coding standards wish list 12-07-2005
PS More App Designer options 11-30-2005
PS Pages in App Designer 11-23-2005
PS Finding objects on the menu 11-14-2005
PS Magic search record fields 10-31-2005
PS Documenting object attributes 10-24-2005
PS Monitoring server performance 10-17-2005
PS Searching PeopleCode 10-10-2005
PS Speeding up App Designer 10-03-2005
PS Using the message catalog 09-26-2005
PS Good ideas that sometimes aren't09-19-2005
PS And now Siebel 09-12-2005
SQRDate comparisons 09-05-2005
PSSQRFTP options 08-29-2005
PSSQRMoving code across environments08-22-2005
PS Spring cleaning 08-15-2005
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PS Change control in App Designer08-01-2005
PS App Engine: disadvantages 07-25-2005
PS App Engine: advantages 07-18-2005
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General Creating Excel files 07-05-2005
PS Dave's next move 06-27-2005
SQRSQR variable oddities 06-20-2005
SQRSQR arrays 06-13-2005
SQRCompiling SQRs 06-06-2005
PS 5-character SETIDs 05-30-2005
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PS Running the in-place conv 05-09-2005
PS Searching for fields in DB 05-02-2005
PS Converting setup data 04-25-2005
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PS Upgrading without an upgrade 04-04-2005
PS Scheduling patches 03-28-2005
PS To patch or not? 03-21-2005
PS Basic tools 03-14-2005
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PS User indexes 02-14-2005
PS Page changes in App Designer 02-07-2005
General Generate SQL from SQL 01-31-2005
SQRSQR report viewer 01-24-2005
General Bug or enhancement? 01-17-2005
PSSQRTagging objects and code 01-10-2005
General Issue tracking 01-03-2005
PS PeopleSoft 10? 12-27-2004
PS Purging tables 12-20-2004
PS Acquisition 12-13-2004
PS Exporting PCode as text 12-06-2004
PS Simplify SQR code 11-29-2004
PS New site for SQR info 11-22-2004
PS Comparing objects 11-08-2004
PS Applying SQL-from-SQL 11-01-2004
General Generating SQL with SQL 10-25-2004
General Generating SQL 10-18-2004
PS Scrambling data 10-11-2004
PS What's going on with PS? 10-04-2004
SQRPrint positioning in SQR 09-27-2004
PS Oracle vs. PeopleSoft 09-13-2004
General Word, email, and lava lamps 09-06-2004
PS Custom run control: tips 08-30-2004
PS Custom run control: building 08-23-2004
PS PeopleCode, behind the scenes 08-16-2004
PS Language-specific pages 08-09-2004
SQRUsing substitution variables 08-02-2004
SQRSQR substitution variables 08-02-2004
PS HTML areas 07-19-2004
SQRRecursion in SQR 07-12-2004
SQRSQR code formatting 07-06-2004
SQRDebugger beta release 06-28-2004
PS Application Designer tidbits 06-27-2004
PS Configuration for custom SQR 06-14-2004
PSSQRModify or clone? 06-07-2004
PS Identifying custom objects 06-01-2004
PS EFFDT again 05-24-2004
General Change-only interface: impl 05-17-2004
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PS Component PeopleCode 04-25-2004
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