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Bug #5017

closed

ReportLayout LSID and referral list should be maintained

Added by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago. Updated about 13 years ago.

Status:
Resolved
Priority:
Normal
Category:
reporting
Target version:
Start date:
05/19/2010
Due date:
% Done:

0%

Estimated time:
Bugzilla-Id:
5017

Description

When a user changes a reportLayout, its LSID revision should increment.
When a user changes a reportLayout with an LSID that has a non-local namespace, the LSID should go into a referral list, and a new LSID should be generated and then incremented on subsequent changes.

Actions #1

Updated by ben leinfelder almost 14 years ago

are report layouts now NamedObjs or something?
Where is the referral list stored if not?

Actions #2

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

They're still not NamedObjs. Unfortunately the constructor for NamedObjIdReferralList needs a NamedObj. Aaron recommended refactoring NamedObjIdReferralList, or having reportLayout keep a NamedObj member to serve as proxy. The latter seems kludgy, but may be the way to go since we're trying to ship 2.0.

One problem currently is that reporting attempts to increment the LSID even if it's from a different namespace, and this is not allowed and thus gives errors. The ideal thing here would be to keep a referral list. One cheat, if we don't care about the origins of a reportLayout, is to simply create a new lsid and discard the old.

Actions #3

Updated by ben leinfelder almost 14 years ago

Hmm, I'm trying to think of how we'd use the "provenance of the report layout". I suppose that could be useful for undo/redo operations? But it seems like we don't have an immediate need to keep track of history, the more pressing need is to avoid nasty exceptions when trying to update the LSID.

Actions #4

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

It might also be nice to see who originally created and who contributed to a report layout, esp in a 'publication kar'. But I agree, discarding may be more prudent at this juncture.

Actions #5

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

The report layout LSID is now incremented whenever the user saves a KAR file, but only if it is in the local namespace. If it is not a local instance, we have decided NOT to add it the referral list at this time. Seems to be working well, closing this bug now if there are no objections.

Actions #6

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

Hey Debi, while it may be ok to only increment the LSID whenever a report layout is saved, one of the ways a report layout is saved is to provenance when the workflow is run. So if the LSID now only increments during a save to KAR, that won't be sufficient because of the following scenario:

1) Design a workflow and report layout
2) Execute (call this run1)
3) Change the report layout
4) Execute (call this run2)
5) Export to KAR run1
6) Export to KAR run2

run1.kar and run2.kar now contain two different report layouts, but each with the same LSID.

Less important, but just to note: another reason I'm not a fan of this approach is that you can design a workflow and report, save to kar, then save to another kar, and you then have two report layouts that are essentially identical, but simply have different LSIDs (the LSID is the only thing keeping them from being the same).

Actions #7

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

So, just to be sure that I am understanding you correctly -- are you saying that using the ReportLayoutKAREntryHandler for this purpose is not sufficient ? and that we need to increment it when the workflow runs as well ? Can you suggest what you think the best approach to doing that would be ?

Currently, doing it in the ReportLayoutKAREntryHandler using saveReportLayout, does seem to be working very reliably, and I hate to change that.

Thanks.

Actions #8

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

Yes, it's not sufficient because scenarios like comment#6 are still possible.

I think the best approach is to roll the report layout's LSID whenever the report layout is changed.

If you don't want to do it this way, but instead only on saves, then you need to roll it before any save, which includes before the save to provenance when the workflow is run.

Actions #9

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #8)

Yes, it's not sufficient because scenarios like comment#6 are still possible.

I think the best approach is to roll the report layout's LSID whenever the
report layout is changed.

If you don't want to do it this way, but instead only on saves, then you need
to roll it before any save, which includes before the save to provenance when
the workflow is run.

O.K. sounds like a good idea. I have now had it update the revision whenever files are written to Provenance as well. Does that seem like it will adequately address the issues you have described ?

Actions #10

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #9)

(In reply to comment #8)

Yes, it's not sufficient because scenarios like comment#6 are still possible.

I think the best approach is to roll the report layout's LSID whenever the
report layout is changed.

If you don't want to do it this way, but instead only on saves, then you need
to roll it before any save, which includes before the save to provenance when
the workflow is run.

O.K. sounds like a good idea. I have now had it update the revision whenever
files are written to Provenance as well. Does that seem like it will
adequately address the issues you have described ?

Also I have now tested this using the same steps described in your Comment #6.
Upon viewing the ROML LSIDS for each run, they are now different, as well as incremented sequentially by 1, each time the workflow is run, AND/OR each time a KAR is saved.

Please review and let me know if you agree, so that we can close this bug for now.
Thanks.

Actions #11

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

Sounds good. Can you poke around looking for any other similar problems -- e.g. what happens when you have multiple copies of the same report open (same LSID), make changes to one, but switch to the original window and execute that workflow? There exist in the system at that moment two report layouts with the same LSID. Hopefully the right report is used and has its LSID incremented, and hopefully the other report doesn't lose its changes, will have it's LSID incremented and be saved to prov when that wf is run, etc.

Actions #12

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #11)

Sounds good. Can you poke around looking for any other similar problems -- e.g.
what happens when you have multiple copies of the same report open (same LSID),
make changes to one, but switch to the original window and execute that
workflow? There exist in the system at that moment two report layouts with the
same LSID. Hopefully the right report is used and has its LSID incremented, and
hopefully the other report doesn't lose its changes, will have it's LSID
incremented and be saved to prov when that wf is run, etc.

After testing I have found that what happens in this case, is that when you open two copies of the same workflow, select one of them, make changes to one, then switch to the original window and execute that workflow, then the LSID for the report layout is incremented at that point. There are no longer 'two' report layouts. There is one current layout, and one layout that has (in essence) been changed (by running the workflow) but not saved. If you switch to the workflow in either window they will both show the same LSID for the report layout. If you go to that window where the first change was made it will always reload the layout from the workflow no matter what. This is something that we chose not to address for this release and can be referenced in Bug #5009 (i.e. Opening two KARS that have the same Workflow, but that have different report layouts, will make the first layout refresh itself with the layout from the KAR that was opened most recently.) which still applies.

Can I suggest that this is satisfactory for now and that we should close this bug ?

Actions #13

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #12)

(In reply to comment #11)

Sounds good. Can you poke around looking for any other similar problems -- e.g.
what happens when you have multiple copies of the same report open (same LSID),
make changes to one, but switch to the original window and execute that
workflow? There exist in the system at that moment two report layouts with the
same LSID. Hopefully the right report is used

I gave the above a try, and what I found (by looking at the generated report) is that the wrong layout is used (the other window's layout--the one modified by user-- is used).

and has its LSID incremented, and
hopefully the other report doesn't lose its changes, will have it's LSID
incremented and be saved to prov when that wf is run, etc.

After testing I have found that what happens in this case, is that when you
open two copies of the same workflow, select one of them, make changes to one,
then switch to the original window and execute that workflow, then the LSID for
the report layout is incremented at that point. There are no longer 'two'
report layouts. There is one current layout, and one layout that has (in
essence) been changed (by running the workflow) but not saved. If you switch
to the workflow in either window they will both show the same LSID for the
report layout.

How are you looking at the report layout here? I'm confused.

If you go to that window where the first change was made it
will always reload the layout from the workflow no matter what.

Confused here also. For the above scenario, my unmodified layout stays unmodified in the gui. This bug would be a little less confusing if the layout did refresh to show the changes in the other window, since they will be used during execution.

This is
something that we chose not to address for this release and can be referenced
in Bug #5009 (i.e. Opening two KARS that have the same Workflow, but that have
different report layouts, will make the first layout refresh itself with the
layout from the KAR that was opened most recently.) which still applies.

Can I suggest that this is satisfactory for now and that we should close this
bug ?

I wouldn't close it because I'm guessing incrementing the lsid whenever the report layout is changed is a good way to solve the bug. If we want to add a caveat about not being able to have two copies of the same workflow+report layout pair opened at once then we could maybe postpone the bug.

Actions #14

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #13)

(In reply to comment #12)

(In reply to comment #11)

Sounds good. Can you poke around looking for any other similar problems -- e.g.
what happens when you have multiple copies of the same report open (same LSID),
make changes to one, but switch to the original window and execute that
workflow? There exist in the system at that moment two report layouts with the
same LSID. Hopefully the right report is used

I gave the above a try, and what I found (by looking at the generated report)
is that the wrong layout is used (the other window's layout--the one modified
by user-- is used).

and has its LSID incremented, and
hopefully the other report doesn't lose its changes, will have it's LSID
incremented and be saved to prov when that wf is run, etc.

After testing I have found that what happens in this case, is that when you
open two copies of the same workflow, select one of them, make changes to one,
then switch to the original window and execute that workflow, then the LSID for
the report layout is incremented at that point. There are no longer 'two'
report layouts. There is one current layout, and one layout that has (in
essence) been changed (by running the workflow) but not saved. If you switch
to the workflow in either window they will both show the same LSID for the
report layout.

How are you looking at the report layout here? I'm confused.

If you go to that window where the first change was made it
will always reload the layout from the workflow no matter what.

Confused here also. For the above scenario, my unmodified layout stays
unmodified in the gui. This bug would be a little less confusing if the layout
did refresh to show the changes in the other window, since they will be used
during execution.

This is
something that we chose not to address for this release and can be referenced
in Bug #5009 (i.e. Opening two KARS that have the same Workflow, but that have
different report layouts, will make the first layout refresh itself with the
layout from the KAR that was opened most recently.) which still applies.

Can I suggest that this is satisfactory for now and that we should close this
bug ?

I wouldn't close it because I'm guessing incrementing the lsid whenever the
report layout is changed is a good way to solve the bug. If we want to add a
caveat about not being able to have two copies of the same workflow+report
layout pair opened at once then we could maybe postpone the bug.

To document our conversation from the REAP meeting today, it sounds like the more basic problem to all of this is the fact that the KAR only references the last report layout that is generated. We should definitely address this as soon as possible. However, since it will take a significant effort and will have a fairly wide impact - it may need to be delayed until the next release.

Actions #15

Updated by debi staggs almost 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #14)

(In reply to comment #13)

(In reply to comment #12)

(In reply to comment #11)

Sounds good. Can you poke around looking for any other similar problems -- e.g.
what happens when you have multiple copies of the same report open (same LSID),
make changes to one, but switch to the original window and execute that
workflow? There exist in the system at that moment two report layouts with the
same LSID. Hopefully the right report is used

I gave the above a try, and what I found (by looking at the generated report)
is that the wrong layout is used (the other window's layout--the one modified
by user-- is used).

and has its LSID incremented, and
hopefully the other report doesn't lose its changes, will have it's LSID
incremented and be saved to prov when that wf is run, etc.

After testing I have found that what happens in this case, is that when you
open two copies of the same workflow, select one of them, make changes to one,
then switch to the original window and execute that workflow, then the LSID for
the report layout is incremented at that point. There are no longer 'two'
report layouts. There is one current layout, and one layout that has (in
essence) been changed (by running the workflow) but not saved. If you switch
to the workflow in either window they will both show the same LSID for the
report layout.

How are you looking at the report layout here? I'm confused.

If you go to that window where the first change was made it
will always reload the layout from the workflow no matter what.

Confused here also. For the above scenario, my unmodified layout stays
unmodified in the gui. This bug would be a little less confusing if the layout
did refresh to show the changes in the other window, since they will be used
during execution.

This is
something that we chose not to address for this release and can be referenced
in Bug #5009 (i.e. Opening two KARS that have the same Workflow, but that have
different report layouts, will make the first layout refresh itself with the
layout from the KAR that was opened most recently.) which still applies.

Can I suggest that this is satisfactory for now and that we should close this
bug ?

I wouldn't close it because I'm guessing incrementing the lsid whenever the
report layout is changed is a good way to solve the bug. If we want to add a
caveat about not being able to have two copies of the same workflow+report
layout pair opened at once then we could maybe postpone the bug.

To document our conversation from the REAP meeting today, it sounds like the
more basic problem to all of this is the fact that the KAR only references the
last report layout that is generated. We should definitely address this as
soon as possible. However, since it will take a significant effort and will
have a fairly wide impact - it may need to be delayed until the next release.

After the REAP meeting today, Matt, Derik, and I discussed some of the issues related to this bug. In the course of our discussion the following problem was described:

Window 1
Workflow [A] KAR 0
Layout [0]

Window 2
Workflow [A] KAR0 -> KAR1
Layout [0] -> Layout1

Workflow [B]
Layout [1]
Layout [2]
Layout [3]

The following solutions were proposed:

1. LayoutChangedEvent to sync layouts on change via refresh
-- might be hard, and isn't the right direction

2. Support mulitple layouts per wf
-- a. gui menu to save layout, menu to switch in RD, menu to
switch in report viewer, render mutliple reports.
-- b. could just allow layouts to diverge, association maintained in manager
that uses tableau window and layout ID (rather than Worflow LSID)

3. Don't allow the same wf to be opened more than once
-- would limit the ability of WRM to open multiple runs of same wf.

After some discussion, we decided that solution 2b would provide the best functionality at this time, and would result in application behaviors that users could reasonably anticipate.

Actions #16

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

As of r25050 I believe I have the report LSID being properly maintained - if the user deletes, adds, rearranges, or edits report items, or changes their properties, or changes the title, the LSID will roll. This could be improved, but I think it's ok as is.
(Improvements:
- all text areas use a DocumentListener for changes, so any letter you type or delete rolls the LSID - if the GUI required the user do something to 'complete' their changes to any given text area, I could then do a comparison between the old and new values and only roll the LSID once.
- the image report item will roll LSID whenever the user clicks on the '+ Get Image' button - it would be better to compare new and previous Images to see if they are different before rolling LSID
- when dragging a panel and dropping it back in the location from which you started will roll the LSID - no need to roll here
)

We decided to not maintain the referral list, so if the report has a non local lsid it gets tossed and a new one is used.

These changes are in 2.0 only for now, I'll merge into trunk later.

Now the issue in comment#15 and bug#5009 can probably be addressed.

Actions #17

Updated by Derik Barseghian almost 14 years ago

Comment#15 should be fixed now in 2.0 at r25056. Needs to be merged into trunk.

Actions #18

Updated by Derik Barseghian about 13 years ago

I'm having trouble understanding the "problem" described in comment#15 at this point, so I'll just trust my comment#17 saying I fixed comment#15. I merged everything a long time ago, so closing.

Actions #19

Updated by Redmine Admin about 11 years ago

Original Bugzilla ID was 5017

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