Working With Projects

This chapter provides an overview of projects and discusses how to:

• View projects.

• Create and save projects.

• Set project properties.

• Insert definitions into a project.

• Remove definitions from a project.

• Merge projects.

• Use change projects.

• Set project options.

• Validate projects.

• Set system IDs.

Understanding Projects

While not one of the eight steps of application development, using projects is an efficient way to organize your definitions as you develop and configure your application. A project simply keeps track of all definition types as a simple list of definition names; it is not where the definitions are stored. Development definitions exist outside of the project in your PeopleSoft database.

You are not required to use projects in PeopleSoft Application Designer; you can create and edit individual definitions without associating them with a project. However, using projects can help you:

• Organize related definitions.

• Understand relationships among definitions.

• Coordinate the work of several developers.

• Streamline upgrade tasks.

• Search for fields or records.

• Access related definitions easily.

Viewing Projects

On the left-hand side of your screen, the project workspace displays one project at a time and all of its definitions, making them easily accessible for opening and editing. It includes two views representing the collection of definitions in the project: Development and Upgrade. Switch between the views by selecting the folder tabs at the bottom of the project workspace.

This section discusses how to:

• Access definitions for a project.

• Using the upgrade view.

Accessing Definitions for a Project

In the Development view, the project folder contains a folder for each definition type included in the project. To open folders and view related definitions, click the expand (+) button. Access the definitions for a project by double-clicking the definition.

The definitions appear in a project tree, organized by definition type. The project tree enables you to see all definitions associated with the project and their connection, by showing the definitions in an hierarchical format. By expanding definitions that have nested levels, such as records, you'll see the field definitions included in that record.

Using the Upgrade View

The Upgrade view helps to streamline the migration of definitions—such as records, pages, or PeopleCode—from one PeopleSoft database to another. It displays all of the definitions available for upgrade and attributes related to the upgrade process. When you double-click a definition type in the Upgrade view, an upgrade definition window appears in the definition workspace, displaying the definitions of that type that are available for upgrade and the associated upgrade options.

This view is important when moving changes into production and when upgrading to new PeopleSoft releases. Definitions in development projects and upgrade projects are interchangeable, meaning that components that were developed in PeopleSoft Application Designer can be copied or compared using the Upgrade view.

See Also

Upgrading with PeopleSoft Application Designer

Creating and Saving Projects

This section discusses how to:

• Create a new project.

• Save a project.

Note. Changes that you make to a definition in a project are also reflected outside the project. Before you change a definition in a project, be aware of how it might affect other definitions outside the project. For example, when you rename or delete a field, you do so globally. Although you can enter a project name as selection criteria in certain PeopleSoft Application Designer dialog boxes (such as Open, Rename, and Delete), this is just to narrow the list of definitions returned in the selection list.

Creating a New Project

When you start PeopleSoft Application Designer, an empty project titled "Untitled" always appears, whether you use the project or not. Unlike other definitions, only one project can be open at a time. Although PeopleSoft encourages you to develop in projects, you can hide the project workspace window and ignore the project entirely.

To create a new project:

1. Select File, New.

2. Highlight Project as the new definition type to create, and click OK.

Note. Another way to create a new project is to open an existing project. Then, select File, Save Project As, and enter a new name for the project. All of the existing definitions in the project are also copied.

See Saving Definitions.

To open an existing project, follow the same procedure as you would for any other definition type.

See Opening Definitions.

Saving a Project

Use a different command when saving an entire project than when saving other types of definitions.

To save a project, select File, Save Project. You can also select File, Save Project As to save the project with a new name. This is a good way to make a copy of a project, because the original project still exists under the original name.

The save toolbar button saves whichever definition is active in the definition workspace, but it cannot be used to save an entire project.

Setting Project Properties

Use the Project Properties dialog box to enter information about the project. Access Project Properties from the File menu.

In the General tab, enter a description of the project and any additional comments you might want others to be aware of when using the project. Select the Change Project check box only if you are creating a change project to be used with the Change Packager. Selecting this option enables the Update IDs and the Pre-Requisites tabs, also used only with the Change Packager.

See Using Change Packages.

Select the appropriate Owner ID for the project. The Owner ID allows for a way to identify which definitions are owned by which PeopleSoft applications, such as PeopleSoft General Ledger, Accounts Receivables, and so on. The values in the drop-down list box are translate table values associated with the OBJECTOWNERID field.

Inserting Definitions Into a Project

You can add definitions to a project by selecting Definitions into Project from the Insert menu.

To insert a definition into a project:

You can:

• Insert definitions individually.

• Select a number of definitions to insert as a group.

Inserting a Single Definition

To insert a single definition into a project:

1. Open the definition that you want to insert into the project.

   Make sure that the definition is the active definition in the definition workspace.

2. Select Insert, Current Definition into Project.

   The definition is added to whichever project is currently open.

Inserting a Group of Definitions

To insert a group of definitions into a project:

1. Select Insert, Definitions into Project.

   The Insert into Project dialog box appears.

2. Select the type of definition to insert from the Definition drop-down list box.

   To see all available definitions of that type, including upgrade-only definition types, click the Insert button or press Enter.

3. (Optional) Enter the selection criteria.

   Name	Enter the definition name or a partial field name and press ENTER.
   Type	Narrow your search by selecting a specific definition type, such as View for a record definition.
   Owner ID	Narrow your search further by selecting an application with which the definition is used.

4. Select the definitions to insert.

   To select multiple definitions, hold down either Shift or Ctrl while clicking the appropriate definitions.

5. (Optional) Specify which related definitions to insert.

   To insert related definitions, specify them in the list of related definitions. To select multiple related definitions, hold down either Shift or Ctrl while clicking the appropriate definitions.

   Note. After you insert definitions into a project, the upgrade-only definitions appear in the upgrade view of the project workspace, not the development view.

   The status bar at the bottom of the Insert into Project dialog box indicates that definitions have been inserted. Additionally, the Results tab on the output window displays the number of definitions inserted each time you perform an insert.

Removing Definitions From a Project

Removing a definition from a project is different than deleting it from the database. When you remove a definition from a project, the reference to the definition is removed from the project, but the definition still exists in the database and thus may be a part of any other project.

To remove definitions from a project:

1. In the project workspace, select the definition that you want to remove from the project.

   To select multiple items, highlight one or more nodes by using the Ctrl key while clicking the definitions to remove.

2. Press Delete, or right-click to select Remove from Project from the pop-up menu.

   This does not delete the definition; it just removes it from the project.

Merging Projects

You can merge two or more projects by inserting all of the definitions from one project into another.

To merge projects:

1. Open the project in which you want to insert another project.

2. Select File, Merge Projects.

   The Merge Projects dialog box appears.

3. Enter selection criteria.

   1. Enter a project name or description (or the beginning characters of either).

   2. Click Insert or press Enter to display projects matching the selection criteria that you entered.

4. Select a project to insert into your currently open project.

   Double-click the project that you want to insert, or highlight the project and click Insert. To select multiple projects, use the Shift or Ctrl keys.

5. Click Insert.

   All selected definitions are inserted into the project in one action. After each insert, note the information in the status bar and on the Results tab in the output window.

Using Change Projects

Change projects are used with the Change Packager feature to enable you to group together definitions that are affected by PeopleSoft application updates. Combined with the PeopleSoft Change Assistant, the Change Packager feature significantly reduces the complexity and time required to apply application updates from PeopleSoft.

When you create a change project, you must set the appropriate update IDs and pre-requisites.

Setting Project Options

Set processing options for all project operations in the Project Options dialog box.

To set project options:

1. Select Tools, Options.

   The Options dialog box appears.

2. Select the Project tab in the Options dialog box.

   Define when and how definitions are added to the project and how the project appears in the project workspace.

   When definition is opened	Automatically inserts any definition that you open into the current project.
   When definition is modified and saved, or deleted	Automatically inserts any definition that you save or delete into the current project.
   Manually	Does not automatically insert any definition into the current project. This is the default option. Use the Insert menu bar to insert a definition into the project.
   Do not insert related definitions with current definition	Does not prompt you to include related definitions. Only the specified definition is inserted, not related definitions.
   Prompt user to pick related definitions to insert	After you select Insert, Current Definition into Project, a dialog box appears, prompting you to pick which related definitions to insert.
   Reload last project at startup	When starting PeopleSoft Application Designer, the project that was last opened in the previous session opens automatically.
   Show definitions in project	Displays a black mark next to icons for definitions that are explicitly in a project (Development view) to indicate that they are in the project. Attribute definitions, which are not explicitly part of the project, are not marked.
   Prompt for properties when definition is saved	Prompts you with a definition properties dialog box before you can save the definition.

Validating Projects

An important part of the PeopleSoft upgrade process involves validating your upgrade project. PeopleSoft Application Designer includes a validate utility to make sure that all definitions included in the project actually exist in your database.

To validate a project:

1. Close all active component definitions in the definition workspace.

   Otherwise, the validation occurs in the component, rather than the project.

2. Select Tools, Options.

3. Select the Validate tab in the Options dialog box.

4. Select Validate project integrity.

5. Click OK.

6. Select Tools, Validate Project.

The validate utility runs a series of tests on the project or components and sends its results to the Validate tab in the output window. If errors are found, they are listed on this tab.

Setting System IDs

The system ID functionality makes system ID maintenance easier for developers. This is especially true for those working on mobile applications where the System ID field must be set to SYNCID on the record properties for each record of each component used in mobile applications.

You can set the system ID for an overall project or for the current record definition in the project workspace.

To set system IDs for a project:

1. Open the project.

2. Select Build, Set System IDs for Project

   The Build Progress dialog box appears, displaying the progress of the command for the number of objects affected by this command.

See Also

Understanding the Synchronization ID and Datetime Stamp