-    COMPARISON    

Comparison: UD6/CMtool Driver and Compuware's PVCS-Uniface Bridge

March Hare's experience at implementing VC-Link PVCS-Bridge solutions in Uniface led us to deciding that there must be a better way. With many complaints heard about the UVCS system bundled with Uniface, and Compuware's announcement that future versions of Uniface will NOT include UVCS, we became desperate for a better solution, so we built it..

Feature
UD6/CMtool Driver
 PVCS Link
Supports PVCS VM 6
YES
YES
Supports PVCS VM 6.5
YES
NO
Supports CM tools like ClearCase, and eChangeMan
YES
NO
Supports free SCC tools like CVS
YES
NO
Developers cannot change code that is not booked out
YES
NO
Developers can only see mods that are committed
YES (1)
NO
Changes between versions are stored as deltas
YES (2)
NO (3)
Can provide complete details of 'differences' between versions (including data types, component variables, form layout etc)
YES (2)
NO (4)
Number of reports the user needs to run to show all the procedural differences between 2 versions of a form component with 50 fields and 4 entities? 1 (2) 55 (5)
SCM/CM functions can be done on server (not just Windows client)
YES (2)
NO
Developers can access full set of CM tool commands, like lock, get copy, check out, check in, promote etc.
YES
NO, subset provided
Can quickly list 'checked out' components.
YES
slow

 

Reports from VC-Link Users:
1
If the contents of the Uniface Repository are lost, it is impossible to load it back using the information contained in the PVCS repository, since the Uniface tables which contain the 'VC-Link' information are never secured in the PVCS repository.
2
If users are denied permission to perform certain actions within PVCS, VC-Link still allows them to perform those actions (eg: add a new archive).

Read more about Uniface Version Control

Note (1) : Optionally, depending on configuration settings.

Note (2) : Optionally, provided that the SCM/CM tool of your choice supports this feature.

Note (3): Whilst it is possible to store the VC-Link exports as deltas, since they are encoded in TRX format, the delta mechanism usually fails to make reasonable difference to the size of the change.

Note (4) : VC-Link can only provide details of procedural differences, not differences in data types, widgets, Form layout (paint tableau) or many of the other elements that go into making a Uniface application (if you have a Compuware MyUniface login, refer to this page).

Note (5.) : VC-Link's 'differences of procedural code' report is performed on an element by element basis. So therefore to find ALL the code differences for a form component with 50 fields, and 4 entities you would need to request the 'all triggers' differences report for 55 objects (1 component, 50 fields, 4 entities). If you have a Compuware MyUniface login, refer to this page.

Note: This comparison is based on VC-Link 2.05 and UD6/CMtool Driver 1.00.00. As far as March Hare are aware, these details are true and correct for the latest versions of these products.

$Revision: 1.11 $ $Date: 2013/09/24 06:51:57 $[go to top]