Updated April 25th, 2012 Software for Monitoring & Control

VTS Application Version Control (AVC)

Optional Feature
VTS Application Version Control (AVC) provides change traceability, enhances application management in networked environments and greatly improves recovery from unexpected effects of configuration changes. Since version 10, each application includes a repository of incremental configuration changes from version to version. AVC is an integrated toolset that allows access to this version history. It is available as an optional licensed feature on any VTS Full Development license and is available as a standard feature on System Integrator licenses. AVC maintains versions of VTS applications rather than VTS core product releases.

A set of easy-to-use features allows administrators to:

1. 2. 3. 4. See a full change history of the application. Identify incremental changes made in each version. Switch to any previous known good version. Merge changes in a multi-developer environment.

New in VTS 10.1

Cherry-pick specific changes when merging versions. Burrow into versions to see side-by-side views of changes. VTS Diff Viewer shows number of changed files. File count on VTS Manifest Panel. Search properties in the Edit Properties dialog. See the number of tags that were imported. Indicator shows undistributed local changes.

Version Control can be run in one of two modes:

1. Automatically Deploy turned ON - Changes are automatically sent out in real time to all application computers. This is applicable to a single computer application or when first developing an application (i.e. system integrator). Automatically Deploy turned OFF - Changes will be applied to the local computer only. They must be manually deployed in order to send them to all application computers and before they will be included in a VTS application Changeset. This mode is applicable to a networked application or multideveloper environment.

2.

Version Control works with the change management features of VTS, in particular Deploy Changes and Revert Changes. These features are still available even if Version Control has not been purchased. IMPORTANT: Automatically Deploy is turned ON by default when updating an application to VTS10 from a previous version. It can be switched OFF if not appropriate.

Change Records and the Version Log

When local changes are made to tags, displays, scripts, security, and other parts of an application, they are stored in a Local Change record. If changes are deployed, a new Deployed Change record is created and the user is prompted for a comment (e.g. Added station graphics). Once deployed, changes are sent to all computers running the application.

Local and Deployed change records are placed in a reverse chronological Version Log, which can be accessed by any authorized user with the VTS Application Version Control option enabled on his/her VTS Full Development workstation. Note: When Automatically Deploy is turned ON, the Version Log will only display D versions (e.g. WorkstationName-D8), since all local changes are automatically deployed and no local changes ever exist. The Version Log keeps track of which version is running on each application computer. This is essential in networked applications and those with distributed client/server topology. The administrator may monitor the entire network from a single location.

Traceability
Each record in the Version Log includes a unique version number, date / timestamp, the user who made the changes, the workstation on which the changes were made and a comment. An administrator may drill down into the Version Log and see details of all incremental changes made within any version. A color-code legend helps quickly identify the from and to states of each changed element. Note: When Automatically Deploy is turned ON, the D versions (e.g. WorkstationName-D8) will include all incremental change details. When it is turned OFF, the L versions (e.g. WorkstationName-L15) will include all incremental change details.

Switching Versions
In the event that changes are deployed which negatively affect the application, the administrator can undo these changes by selecting a previous version in the Log and switching to it. The selected version is duplicated and becomes the current version.

Reverse Version Changes (i.e. Version Rollback)

Reversing a version change creates a new version of the application and removes all changes from the reversed version. IMPORTANT: Avoid reversing changes if later work depends on changes in the version being reversed. Although nothing is erased, there could be undesirable results. For example, reversing the creation of a tag will affect displays, calculations and other features that use the tag.

Merge Version Changes

If either the Switch to Version or Reverse Version features have been used, later versions may be re-introduced to an application using the Merge Version feature. For example, if you have switched from version 10 to version 5, you may select version 7and merge its changes back into the application. Remember, if Automatically Deploy is turned ON, the actions above will generate a new D version which will be automatically deployed to all computers on the network. When Automatically Deploy is turned OFF, the actions will create a new L version which must be deployed manually.
Trihedral Engineering Limited, Bedford, Canada Trihedral, Inc., Orlando, Florida Trihedral UK Limited, Aberdeen, Scotland 1.902.835.1575 1.407.888.8203 +44 (0) 1224 258910 info@trihedral.com / www.trihedral.com 1.800.463.2783 (North America) Trihedral Engineering Limited 2012