Adding data providers to Lifecycle Query Engine by using URLs

Any lifecycle management tool that supports the Tracked Resource Set (TRS) specification can be a data provider for the Lifecycle Query Engine index. When a lifecycle management application runs on a different Jazz® Team Server than Lifecycle Query Engine, you can add it as data provider for Lifecycle Query Engine by using a data provider URL. If the application doesn't have a root services document, you can register the TRS feed as a data provider for Lifecycle Query Engine by typing the OAuth URLs. This is the most complex method of adding data providers to Lifecycle Query Engine. Use this procedure only if you are very familiar with the architecture of your solution. When the data provider URL is registered, Lifecycle Query Engine communicates directly with the TRS provider (the lifecycle management application).

Before you begin

Ensure that Lifecycle Query Engine or LDX functional user (lqe_user) was created in the JTS, as described in Connecting Lifecycle Query Engine or Link Index Provider to applications that use a different Jazz Team Server.

Procedure

  1. From the Lifecycle Query Engine administration page, go to Data Providers at http://<host_name>:<port>/lqe/web/admin/data-sources.
    This page shows the live status of the data providers Lifecycle Query Engine is connected to.
  2. Click Add Data Provider and select Manual URL.
  3. Enter the tracked resource set URL for your application, such as https://server:port/tool/trs. Select the data provider that you want to add.
  4. Add the URL for the access context list to be used when connecting to the TRS provider.
  5. Enter the diagnostic page URL. Some TRS providers publish diagnostic pages where you can validate your TRS feed data. For details, read about Validating TRS feeds and the Lifecycle Query Engine or Link Index Provider index. TRS feed validation can help you troubleshoot reporting problems that occur when resources are skipped during indexing.
  6. Select the type of TRS feed that you are adding.
    Attention: Starting in version 7.0, the Design Management (DM) application is no longer part of the IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management solution. If you are using DM version 6.0.6.1, select the Architecture or Design Management option to add a data provider manually to Lifecycle Query Engine.

    If you are planning to use Report Builder, select the artifact type for the data provider. When a TRS feed is added automatically to Lifecycle Query Engine during setup, Lifecycle Query Engine examines the dcterms:type property of the TRS provider to determine what type of artifacts are provided by the feed. However, when you manually add a TRS feed, Lifecycle Query Engine might not be able to automatically determine the type.

    When you select a type, artifact properties that are defined in different project areas are all merged and listed in the Choose an artifact section in Report Builder. If you don't specify a type for the feed, you might see several instances of the same artifact type in the list.

  7. Add a label as an identifier for the data provider.
  8. Optional: The scheduling fields allow you to set when the initial indexing will occur. If you leave the fields blank, the index is created as soon as the wizard finished. In a test lab environment, Lifecycle Query Engine can index 50 000 artifacts in less than 1 hour. Depending on your hardware and configuration, you might experience a slower indexing rate.
    Note: You can index multiple data providers simultaneously. Each one runs on its own thread. Alternatively, you can schedule the initial indexing of multiple TRS data providers to run one after the other.
  9. Enter the authentication details.
  10. On the Specify Authentication Details pane, enter the authentication information for the application.
    1. In another browser window, find the key that you generated for LQE in: . For example, if you are adding the Engineering Test Management application, go to the QM administrative panel: https://<server>:<port>/QM/admin#action=com.ibm.team.repository.admin.configureOAuth.
      Note: Unless your authentication is delegated to the JTS, go to the administrative panel for the application that you add as data provider, and not to the JTS administrative panel.
    2. In the Authorized Keys list, find and copy the lqe_user key and secret.
    3. Return to the LQE browser window, and enter the Consumer Key and Secret.
    4. Enter the OAuth URLs for your application.
      The URLs are similar to the following examples, where application_context_root is specific to the application that you are adding as data provider, such as ccm, rm, or qm.
      • https://server:port/application_context_root/oauth-request-token
      • https://server:port/application_context_root/oauth-authorize
      • https://server:port/application_context_root/oauth-access-token
  11. Configure the data provider.
    Hover over the question marks next to the property labels to find out details about the properties and their values.
    • The refresh rate specifies how often Lifecycle Query Engine or LDX attempts to access the data provider to refresh the index. A data provider that is not updated frequently can have a slower refresh rate than a data provider that is updated continuously. Increasing the refresh rate has a performance impact.
    • The refresh rate specifies how often Lifecycle Query Engine or LDX attempts to access the data provider to refresh the index. A data provider that is not updated frequently can have a slower refresh rate than a data provider that is updated continuously. Increasing the refresh rate has a performance impact.
    • The number of threads to fetch artifacts when adding or reindexing the data provider should be between 2 and 4. Each thread is roughly equivalent to one user using the Lifecycle Query Engine or LDX server. On Intel systems, if you use more than 4 threads, the improvement in data retrieval speed is minimal.
    • The option to continue with change log processing if resources are skipped, allows Lifecycle Query Engine or LDX to log an error and continue indexing after encountering a resource that cannot be indexed. This option is selected by default. If you disable it, the indexing process stops when a resource cannot be indexed.

What to do next

To stop indexing a data provider, click the name of the data provider in the list, and click the Pause indexing icon.