The Task Manager view lets you automate many of the tasks you have to perform when testing an interface.
Several tasks must commonly be executed at certain stages when performing a test. For instance, you must start InterChange Server Express and connect the Integrated Test Environment perspective to it when preparing to perform a test. Later on in the test you must launch Client Simulator views for the connectors and access clients in the interface, and connect them to the InterChange Server Express instance. To make it easier to execute all of the tasks that tend to relate to a particular stage during the running of a test, Task Manager displays related tasks in groups. The tasks for launching Client Simulator views and connecting them to the InterChange Server Express instance, for example, are collected in a task group named "Start Client Simulators". Task Manager allows you to execute either a single task, or a task group as a whole.
Figure 65 shows the Task Manager view with several tasks and task groups selected.
Table 23 describes the tasks and task groups in the Task Manager view.
Table 23. Tasks and task groups in the Task Manager view
Task name | Task description |
---|---|
Start Server | This is the group for all tasks related to starting InterChange Server Express. |
Launch Server | This task starts the InterChange Server Express instance. This task belongs to the Start Server task group. |
Wait for server initialization | This task causes Integrated Test Environment to wait until InterChange
Server Express has started successfully before trying to connect to it.
If you have not selected this task and Integrated Test Environment tries to connect to InterChange Server Express before the server starts, then Integrated Test Environment will not be able to connect to it. Enabling this option ensures that the task of connecting Integrated Test Environment to InterChange Server Express is automated. |
Connect to Server | This task connects Integrated Test Environment to the InterChange Server
Express instance so that you can manage and deploy components and view
data. This task belongs to the Start Server task
group.
|
Reset Server | This is the group for the Clear Repository task. |
Clear Repository | This task deletes the repository of the InterChange Server Express instance. You would want to perform this task if you plan to deploy a large number of components through Integrated Test Environment and some of the components already exist in the repository. This task belongs to the Reset Server task group. |
Deployment | This is the group for all tasks related to deploying components to the
InterChange Server Express repository through the Task Manager view.
All of the dependent components for an interface must be deployed to test the interface. To deploy components using Integrated Test Environment, you must make sure the InterChange Server Express instance starts in design mode. For more information, see Configuring InterChange Server Express to start in design mode. For more information on the Dependency view, see Using the Outline view. |
Deploy Default Dependents | This task deploys all the components that are determined by the system to
be required for the interface to function, and that are listed beneath the
Default Dependents node in the Dependency view.
This task belongs to the Deployment task group. |
Deploy Optional Maps |
|
Deploy User Dependents | This task deploys all the components that you add to the User
Artifacts node in the Outline view.
This task belongs to the Deployment task group. |
Start Client Simulators | This is the group for all tasks relating to emulating connector agents and access clients. |
Assign Client Simulator Viewers | This task starts Client Simulator view windows for all of the connectors
and access clients involved in the interface.
This task belongs to the Start Client Simulators task group. |
Make server connection | This task causes the Client Simulator views to connect to the InterChange
Server Express instance.
Connector agents and access clients must be connected to InterChange Server Express to exchange business objects. By default a connector starts using its definition in the repository. You can use the Client Simulator view to cause the agent to connect with a configuration file as described in Emulating a connector using the repository definition. Client Simulators can only automatically connect to the server in this way if the DeliveryTransport property of the connector being emulated is set to the value IDL. This task belongs to the Start Client Simulators task group.
|
Start BO Trace | This is the group for all tasks relating to business object
tracing.
Business object tracing records business object data as business objects are processed by components in the system. For more information, see Using the BO Inspector view. |
Clear BO Trace Folder |
This task clears the folder in which business object trace data is stored. You might want to clear the business object trace folder for the following reasons:
This task belongs to the Start BO Trace task group.
|
Start BO Trace |
This task starts business object tracing. You must start business object tracing for Integrated Test Environment to store business object data during the tests you perform. This task belongs to the Start BO Trace task group.
|
Stop BO Trace |
This task stops business object tracing. Business object tracing can be a very resource-intensive task, so depending
on your objectives for the testing you might want to stop business object
tracing if it is more disruptive than helpful.
|
Disconnect Server | This task disconnects Integrated Test Environment from the InterChange Server Express instance. It does not shut down the InterChange Server Express instance. |
Shutdown Server | This task shuts down the InterChange Server Express instance. |
There are several ways to select tasks and task groups. Table 24 describes the different ways. It is recommended that you combine the different approaches to be most efficient.
Table 24. Ways of selecting tasks and task groups in the Task Manager view
To accomplish this... | Do this... |
---|---|
Check a single task within a group | Click the checkbox next to the task. |
Check a group of tasks | Click the checkbox next to the task group. |
Check all tasks in the view | Click the down arrow in the right-hand corner of the title bar of the Task Manager view and choose Check All from the menu. |
Uncheck all tasks in the view | Click the down arrow in the right-hand corner of the title bar of the Task Manager view and choose Uncheck All from the menu. |
Check your preferred tasks | Click the down arrow in the right-hand corner of the title bar of the
Task Manager view and choose Preference Selection from the
menu.
For more information, see Configuring your preferred task selections. |
Check the default tasks | Click the down arrow in the right-hand corner of the title bar of the
Task Manager view and choose Default Selection from the
menu.
The default task and task group selections are:
|
There are several ways to execute the tasks you have selected in the Task Manager view. The following sections describe the different methods:
You can execute all of the tasks within several task groups at once. This makes it easy to prepare the interface for testing without manually managing it through the different stages.
A convenient approach, for instance, is to execute all of the tasks within the Start Server, Start Client Simulators, and Start BO Trace task groups.
Do the following to execute all of the tasks within a selection of task groups:
Be sure not to enable checkboxes for tasks or task groups that have conflicting results. For instance, do not enable both the Launch Server and Shutdown Server tasks.
To execute a single group of tasks, right-click the task group and choose Run. Only the tasks in the task group you right-clicked will execute. The checkbox for the task group does not have to be enabled for its tasks to execute, though the checkboxes for the tasks you want to execute within the group do have to be enabled.
You might use this approach frequently with the Start Client Simulators task group. You will frequently execute groups of tasks to initially prepare a test, as described in Executing selected groups of tasks. You might close the Client Simulator views you have open during the course of a series of tests, however, and then need to launch them and connect them again. You do not have to execute all of the tasks that have already been performed, however--you can execute only the Start Client Simulators task group.
To execute a single task, right-click the task and choose Run. Only the task you right-clicked will execute. The checkbox for the task does not have to be enabled for it to execute.
You might use this approach to shut down the server. You might want to start the server again immediately afterwards, and not want to re-enable all the required checkboxes. You can just right-click the Shutdown Server task and execute it alone.
You can instruct Task Manager to stop its queue of currently executing tasks. It will allow whichever task is currently executing to finish, but will not execute any subsequent tasks. For example, if you choose to stop the tasks while the Launch Server task is executing, then Task Manager will allow the server to finish starting.
Do one of the following to stop the currently executing tasks:
You can instruct Task Manager to kill its currently executing tasks. It will terminate the currently executing task and will not execute any subsequent tasks either. For example, if you choose to kill the tasks while the Launch Server task is executing, then Task Manager does not allow the server to finish starting.
To kill the currently executing tasks, click the down arrow in the right-hand corner of the title bar of the Task Manager view and choose Kill Tasks from the menu.
You can pause the currently executing tasks so that Task Manager allows the currently executing task to complete, but does not execute the remaining tasks until you unpause it. This allows you to start a series of tasks and perform an action which must be done before a later task is reached, but which you forgot about, and without stopping and restarting the remaining tasks. For example, if you want to start the server and deploy the dependents, but some of the components already exist in the repository and you do not realize that until you have already executed the tasks, you could pause the tasks before the deployment stage begins. Then you can use repos_copy to delete the repository so that when the deployment begins it does not fail.
Do one of the following to pause the currently executing tasks:
Do one of the following to cause the tasks to resume executing:
You can save selections as a preference so that you can conveniently apply the selection scheme you use most commonly.
Do the following to configure your preferred task selections:
Figure 66 shows the Task Manager preference selection interface.
Figure 66. Integrated Test Environment task preferences
Do the following to configure the tasks and task groups that will be enabled by default each time you open a particular test unit:
When you open the test unit the next time, the tasks you chose will be selected in the Task Manager view.