6 How to use GIFFT ?
    6.1 Introduction

Once the prerequisites for the installation of GIFFT are in place, the following actions are necessary:

Using your favorite intranet navigator, you connect to the host where the tool has been installed by indicating the following URL: http://<host>/cgi-bin/gifft.cgi and you arrive on the main page of GIFFT :

The following paragraphs describe in detail each function of this tool. The Setup, the Statistics and Test-Book related features are explained in later chapters.

    1. 6.2 Creation of a New sheet

To create a new sheet you choose the related icon of the main menu (Create), and you arrive on the following page:

 

On this page, you only have to fill the different fields of the form. For more detailed description of the fields please report to the Search or the Setup Sections.

When a fact sheet is created, the manager of fact sheets is notified through electronic mail, so he can assign the sheet for analysis.

    1. 6.3 Search for Fact Sheets

      Clicking on the first icon, you arrive on the following page:

      To find one or more fact sheets, this form needs to be filled with the appropriate criteria. Once the fields have been filled, click on the Search button. After a short delay, the tools shows the list of fact sheets corresponding to the selection.

      The display is separated into three different sections. This first section has only one field, and it can only be used alone. The two last sections are used together, with the list of criteria and the display options.

      There is a number of display options. The examples in this document are given in the default display. The different options are explained below.

      Note: for all the configurable lists examples of configuration files are given in the annex. please also refer to the setup section.

        6.3.1 "Trouble Ticket Number" Field

        This field can contain one on more sheet numbers, separated by any character. When this field is used, no other filtering criteria or display option is taken into account.

        6.3.2 "Project" Field

        It is the name of the project you would like to select fact sheets of.

        Please start with this field. Once you change this field, the page will re-load with project-specific values in the list of users, modules, and versions. After you have created your first fact sheet, the tool will remember what project you work on, and the next time you arrive on this page, this field will be filled for you.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.3 "Sub-Project" Field

        This is the subproject which the fact sheet relates to. Once you have created a fact sheet, the tool will remember what subproject you work on, so this field will be filled for you.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.4 "Phase" Field

        This is the phase which the fact sheet relates to. Once you have created a fact sheet, the tool will remember what phase you work on, so this field will be filled for you.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.5 "Assigned to" Field

        This is the username of the person the sheet is assigned to.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        "Submitted by" Field 6.3.6

        This is the username of the person who submitted the sheet.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        "Verified by" Field 6.3.7

        This is the username of the person who verified the sheet.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.8 "Status " Field

        In this field, you have to check the boxes corresponding to the status of the sheet that you would like to display.

        6.3.9 "Module" Field

        This field lets you select the module or program, according to the terminology of the project, which is impacted by the fact sheets.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.10 "Version" Field

        Selects sheets referring to problems found in a given product version.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.11 "Impact" Field

        This field lets to select the impacts of the related sheets.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.12 "Severity" Field

        This field lets you to select sheets of a given severity only.

        6.3.13 "Deadline" Field

        This fields lets you to select sheets relating to problems which should be corrected in a certain product version.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.14 "Problem Type" Field

        This field helps to select only bugs or evolutions.

        6.3.15 "Corrected in" Field

        This fields lets you to select sheets relating to problems which have been corrected in a certain product version.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.16 "Verified in" Field

        This fields lets you to select sheets relating to problems which have been verified in a certain product version.

        Note: this is a configurable list.

        6.3.17 "ADC/ADP" Field

        This field selects sheets where the " MDA/PDA" is filled or empty.

        6.3.18 "Between" Field

This field contains a selector and two dates. By choosing the right value of the selector, you can obtain the following combinations :

Selector

 

Date

 

Date

Created

between

Date 1

and

Date 2

Corrected

between

Date 1

and

Date 2

Verified

between

Date 1

and

Date 2

The returned sheets depend also on the value of the "Status" field. For example:

        6.3.19 "In the Text" Field

        Filling this field selects all the sheets where the typed text appears at any place in any of the sheets. The search is case sensitive, and quite slow compared to the other methods.

        6.3.20 "In the Title" Field

        Filling this field selects all the sheets where the typed text appears at any place in any sheet's title. The search is case sensitive.

        6.3.21 Display Options

        At the bottom of the form there are several display options. The use of these fields is described below:

        1. Sort

In the current version of the tool, it is possible to sort the sheets according to the following methods:

        1. Display the version
        2. If you want to display the version, this box needs to be checked, and you have to choose what kind of version to display. It is possible to show the version of detection of the problem, the deadline, the version of correction, and the version of verification.

        3. Display the selected criteria
        4. By checking this box, it is possible to visualize the selection criteria. this can be useful in case of a print of the list of fact sheets.

        5. Display the ADC/ADP field.
        6. Checking this box will display the field of ADC/ADP in the displayed selected list.

        7. Download Excel Table

Checking this box, instead of obtaining a list as described in the next chapter, you obtain a text file, with all the fields separated by tabulations, which is easily importable in an Excel sheet. The content of the file corresponds to the selected fact sheets. This table can be used as bases for statistics and graphs, other that those provided by the tool.

      Result 6.4 of a search selection
        Index 6.4.1 of the sheets

As soon as the tool has finished it's search, you will see the list of the sheets you juste selected. For example:

List of reports

Index of the 4 reports

Es.I21.00023

1

N

 

Problem on module 1

Es.V21.0004

2

N

 

Problem in starting module 2

Es.S32.00113

2

A

user1

Functionality B52 not conform

Es.S32.00013

2

C

user1

Test of the temporization function

 

First you can see the index of the selected sheet. They are sorted according to the chosen method. Here by state, severity and number.

In the title you can see the number of selected sheets. At the right of the title there is a little printer icon. Clicking on it will print index on the default printer of the host where the tool in installed.

For each sheet you can see:

      1. 6.4.2 Fact Sheet header

The list of detailed description of each fact sheet is shown after the index.

Each fact sheet has a header:

Es.V21.00048

1998/11/19:09.30.58

Status: Verified

Submitted by: user2

Title : Color of ok button

Project: Esprit

Subproject : Group 3

Phase : site validation

Module : general

Severity : Critical

Version : 3.1.12.0

Deadline : v3.1.12.0

Impact : Robustness

Type: Observation

ADC/ADP:

Assigned to : user1

Workload : 5

Corrected by user2 19/01/99:10.23.11 on in v3.1

Verified by user3 on 23/11/98:18.53.30 in v3.2

On the first line of each header these is a series of icons. Clicking on them have the following actions:

Edit the contents of the header

Set the fact sheet on the observed state

Add an analysis to the fact sheet

Make a copy of the sheet

Assign the sheet to a user

Set the fact sheet in Open state

Set the fact sheet in Not-a-Bug state

Set the fact sheet in Not-Reproducible State

Indicate the sheet is a duplicate

Postpone the handling to a later date

Set the fact sheet in the Corrected state

Set the fact sheet in the Verified state

Reject correction of the fact sheet.

Set the fact sheet in the Abandoned state

Print the contents of this sheet on the default printer of the web host. There is of course a print button in the main menu of the navigator, but often the fonts are too large, and there is no way to print just part of the page.

 

On the following lines you can find:

The presence of the following lines depends on the sate of the fact sheet.

        6.4.3 Fact Sheet body

After the header, you can see the body of the fact sheet. It if composed of a description, followed by one or more analyses, possibly a correction, a verification and always a history:

 

Description

user1

19/11/98:09.30.58
Description :

 

The OK button of the GUI is red when it should be green.

 

 

Analysis 1

user2

20/11/98:15.12.30

Bad initialization of the okButtonColor variable in the file gui.c

 

Correction

user2

20/11/98:16.43.12

modification of the file gui.c => version 3.0.1.2

The first word in each paragraph is the title of the attachment. In case it is an analysis, it is a free text. These words are hypertext links. By clicking on them, it is possible to edit the contents of the related paragraph.

Each paragraph contains the name of the author and the date of creation of the attachment.

 

The history at the end of each sheet looks like this :

submitted by user1 on 19/11/98:09.30.58

19/11/98:13.40.22 assigned to aversini by user0

20/11/98:15.12.30 attachment Analyse1 added by user2

20/11/98:16.43.12 corrected by user2

23/11/98:18.53.30 verified by user3

 

      6.5 Assigning a fact sheet

First you have to decide if the problem mentioned in the sheet needs to be solved or not. If it is the case, the problem needs to be analyzed to know what solution to put in place. Once you have decided who had to do this analysis, you have to assign the sheet to this person.

The assignment can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window, and you have to fill in the blanks.

In the assignment window, there are two fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet assigned, the assignee is notified through e-mail containing the sheet he must analyze.

A protection has been put in place to restrict the use of this functionality to the person in charge of managing the fact sheets.

      6.6 Adding an analysis

Under the generic term of analysis, are included all kinds of comments, descriptions, or explanations. Everyone can add an analysis to a fact sheet, even if that person is not the one who the sheet is assigned to.

There are several ways of adding an analysis:

In all cases, the user arrives in the same window where he has to fill in the blanks:

Once the problem analyzed, the person in charge of managing the sheets will receive a notification with the contents of the sheet (and the new analysis). He can then decide what to do with it. Obviously, the analysis needs to be clear on this point.

      Editing an attachment 6.7

      Sometimes, after having added an attachment to a fact sheet (a description, an analysis, a correction, or any other kind of attachment), the user wants to modify it.

      This operation is done by clicking on the name of the attachment in the list of fact sheets. The user arrives on a window where he can edit the contents of the attachments. He should at the same time set his name in the box showing the name of the person editing the attachment.

      When an attachment is edited, the relevant people are notified according to what has been configured.

      6.8 Opening a sheet for correction

Once the problem has been analyzed, it is ready to be corrected. Passing the sheet to the Open state by the person in charge of managing the fact sheets gives the green light to start the modifications.

The opening can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window, and you have to fill in the blanks.

In the opening window, there are two fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet opened, the assignee is notified through e-mail containing the sheet he must correct.

A protection has been put in place to restrict the use of this functionality to the person in charge of managing the fact sheets.

 

      6.9 Correction of a technical fact

The correction attachment looks like any other attachment, except the name is not free : it is always "Correction".

When the person correcting the problem has finished his modifications, he passes the fact sheet in the corrected state. Doing this he fills the paragraph describing the correction. He should include in it the following items:

The correction of a fact sheet can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window, and you have to fill in the blanks.

In the correction window, there are three fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet is in the corrected state, the manager is notified through e-mail containing the sheet that has been corrected.

      6.10 Assigning for verification

When a fact sheet is corrected, the impacted part of the software passes by the hands of the validation team who's task is to verify that the corrections have been done well. The head of the validation team distributes the sheets to be verified to the members of his team.

The assignment can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window, and you have to fill in the blanks.

In the assignment window, there are two fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet assigned, the assignee is notified through e-mail containing the sheet in which he must verify the corrections.

      6.11 Verifying a correction

Once a problem has been corrected, or an evolution implemented, it is ready to be validated. Passing the fact sheet into the verified state indicates that the module has passed the related validation test successfully. The validation of a fact sheet is generally done by the person who submitted the sheet.

The verification can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window, and you have to fill in the blanks.

In the assignment window, there are three fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet verified, the person having done the correction is notified through e-mail containing the sheet so he knows everything is all right.

      6.12 Modifying the header of a sheet

Changing the data in the header of a sheet can be done in several ways:

In all cases, you arrive on the same window which looks like the window of the creation of fact sheets, where all the fields contain the information of the fact sheet.

At this point it is possible to change the values of the fields (after having filled the field of the name of the person who has done the modifications).

If the values of the fields that count to determine the name of the fact sheet are changes, the name of the fact sheet will be changed as well. Therefore, this feature needs to be used with caution, because some fact sheets might "disappear" and one might not think of looking under a different project name for example.

      6.13 Abandon a fact sheet

There are many reasons for abandoning a fact sheet, for example :

To modify these states there are several ways to proceed

In window you arrive, there are three fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet modified, the person who submitted the sheet is notified through e-mail so he can react to the abandon if needed.

      6.14 Postpone the handling of a fact sheet

It is possible to postpone the handling if a fact sheet to a later date. To do this, the status of the fact sheet has to be set to Postponed. It is usually the maager who does this operation.

The modification can be done in several ways:

In the window you end up, there are two fields to fill before clicking on the OK button:

Once the sheet modified, the manager is notified through e-mail.

When the date of the postponing is passed, the sheet is automatically passed to the New state, and the manager is notified.