Articles Tagged 'data'

Articles
How to fix Jira synchronization issues - mapping errors

Sometimes when integrating Jira with Spira, you might receive errors that refer to artifact mappings, statuses, or even users. This can happen  even if the synchronization status is marked as ‘Success’ and highlighted in green. In this article we have combined certain synchronization errors that might appear while configuring integration with Atlassian Jira.

Creating a list of comments for any users in the system

If you need to extract comments for artifact, for a period of time or filtered by comment creator - you can easily do that using Custom Report tool or - if you're using SpiraPlan you can use OData or (PowerBI Desktop) to visually create reports and analysis.

Order of Database Table Deletes when Projects Deleted in Spira

Some of our customers wanted to know that we delete the data in the SpiraTest, SpiraPlan, and SpiraTeam tables when we delete a project.
This article outlines that approximate order of the data being deleted

Database Changes Between Spira v4.2 and v5.0

As part of the v5.0 update to SpiraTest, SpiraPlan and SpiraTeam, we made major changes to the database structure to improve performance and usability as well as lay the foundation for v5.1, v5.2 and v5.3 due out later this year. Customers using custom reports that relied on the old v4.2 database structure will need to modify their custom reports.

This article is obsolete.
This only applies to upgrading to v5.0 which was released in 2016.

How to fix Jira DataSync error codes – 400, 401, 404 and 500

Sometimes during the Jira plugin configuration to sync with Spira, you might get an error that is not self-describing and the errors do not point to an obvious solution. In this article we provide guidance on how to resolve some common synchronization errors with specific error codes (400, 401, 404 and 500)

Finding Old Projects to Purge for GDPR Compliance

With the establishment of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you now may need to find old SpiraTeam projects that are not active any more so that you can delete them and reduce unnecessary storage of personal data.

Preventing DesktopDataSync from Going to Sleep

This article is kindly provided by one of our customers - Boris - who has been using the Desktop Data Sync and JIRA to integrate his on-premise JIRA instance with a cloud instance of SpiraTeam.

Receiving database constraint error when trying to execute a test case or test set

If you are trying to run a test case or test set and you receive the following error:

Messages:
   Database constraint violation occurred [APPLICATION.Business.EntityConstraintViolationException]
   An error occurred while updating the entries. See the inner exception for details. [System.Data.UpdateException]
   Violation of PRIMARY KEY constraint 'XPKTST_ARTIFACT_CUSTOM_PROPERTY'. Cannot insert duplicate key in object 'dbo.TST_ARTIFACT_CUSTOM_PROPERTY'.
The statement has been terminated. [System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException]

Then this article provides the solution for you.

Changing SQL Servers or Updating Server Names

The steps to perform when needing to move the database to another SQl Server, or when changing the DNS name of your SQL Server.

Synchronizing JIRA 5.0+ with Spira version 4.x

The plugins listed on our website for integrating with JIRA are compatible with the latest major version (5.0 at time of writing) of SpiraTest, SpiraPlan or SpiraTeam. This article provides older versions of the JIRA data-synchronization plugin for customers that are using older versions of Spira.

Configuring MS SQL Server for Remote Access

When connecting from Spira or Krono installed on a separate application server to a remote SQL server, you may have difficulties connecting. This article describes the steps for making sure that your SQL Server can be accessed remotely.

Choosing a Database to Run SpiraTeam or KronoDesk On

This article answers some common questions about which databases you can run SpiraTest, SpiraPlan, SpiraTeam and KronoDesk on, and where you can get them from.

After restoring a backup of my database, I keep getting unable to login to database errors?

This usually just means that the restored database just needs to be linked to the existing database server login. This can be done by executing the appropriate SQL command listed below:

How do I migrate data from a trial installation of Spira or KronoDesk to the production one?

This is a common need, since you may have installed SpiraTest, SpiraPlan,  SpiraTeam, or KronoDesk  on a workstation to evaluate its capabilities and now need to install it on a production server for real use, but you don't want to lose all your existing data.

How do I move my SpiraTest/Plan/Team database to another server

This article describes the process and steps for moving your SpiraTest, SpiraPlan or SpiraTeam database from one computer to another.
The article will refer to SpiraTeam, but it applies equally to the other products.

Exporting all incidents out of the system into Excel

Several users have asked - if it is possible to extract all incidents logged in a SpiraTest server no matter what the project is.
Using the built-in Incident reports or Excel Add-In, you have to extract incidents for each project and then move into one spreadsheet however they wanted to know if it was possible to do this as one extract from within the tool.

Data Synchronization with JIRA - What Synchronizes

A customer recently had some questions about what synchronizes between Spira and Jira, so we thought that this article would help clarify things.

Data-driven testing with spreadsheets and RVL

Many test automation scenarios require performing same steps with different data. For example, login into application with different user credentials, or enter several lines of a sales order into a table. This is data-driven testing. From this article you will learn how to do this in Rapise Visual Language (RVL) and JavaScript modes.  You will also learn how to define data within a test and in external spreadsheet.

Doing a SubString on a Database Value in Rapise

When you try and do a substring on a value returned from a database, you may get an error about the object not supporting the property.

Suppressing Text in Rapise Logs for Sensitive Data

A customer had a question - is there a way to suppress the DoSetText or DoSendkeys methods from sending their text to the logs. They didn't want users to see this text in the Rapise (and SpiraTest) logs because they contained sensitive information (e.g.  passwords).

Using Rapise to Validate Display of Data Grid Data

One common requirement is to run a query in an application being tested and verify that the data on the screen matches the data in the application. This article explains the recommended process for doing this.

Using Rapise to extract test data from an Excel sheet

Often you want to be able to parameterize your Rapise tests to have a common set of test functions that can use different combinations of test data. You can use a MS-Excel spreadsheet to store the test data and use Rapise to read out the matching values. This articles provides a sample for doing this.

This article is obsolete. For modern ways of making data-driven tests please refer to Data-Driven Testing documentation topic.

Troubleshooting the Data-Synchronization between SpiraTest and Jira

This article describes some basic troubleshooting steps that you should take when the data-synchronization service between SpiraTest and another bug tracker (in this example Jira, but much of this also applies to other data syncs) does not appear to work correctly.

Using ODATA to Create SpiraPlan Reports using Tableau and/or PowerBI

When using the SpiraPlan ODATA API to create custom reports in popular reporting platforms such as PowerBI and/or Tableau, customers have had some common questions. In this article we answer some of the most frequent ones.

Loading Users into KronoDesk from Excel using Rapise

We had a customer that needed to load in a batch of customer users into our KronoDesk service desk platform. The built-in Excel add-on is only able to import help desk tickets, not users. So in this article we explain how you can use Rapise to bulk load in the data using the KronoDesk REST API.

How to share a query from PowerQuery (Microsoft Excel or PowerBI)

If you're using SpiraPlan's OData to extract data, Power Query helps with extraction and transformations steps that are represented as queries with share options to be used by other users.
This article covers the general mechanisms to share a query in Power Query.

Extracting Custom List value names using OData

If you're using SpiraPlan you can use OData to visually create reports and analsyis. In this example, we are getting an artifact's and product's multi-select custom property value names using Excel Power Query. The build in custom repoort views for artifacts and products show all custom fields, but only their raw values. That means that for custom lists only the ID of the custom list value(s) are shown and not the actual names. Here is what to do to find  and display the names.

Get Area ID from Microsoft Azure DevOps (ADO)

In order to synchronize SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, or SpiraPlan with Microsoft Azure DevOps (ADO) formerly known as Microsoft Team Foundation Services (TFS) you may need the IDs of the Areas inside ADO. This article describes how you can get this from cloud instances of ADO where you do not have access to the database.

Jira Server 9.0 and Later Breaking API Changes

For performance reasons, Atlassian has made breaking changes to the Jira Server API in version 9.0 (and later). This means that is you are using the Spira data synchronization plugin for Jira Server, you need to download the most recent version from our website. This also affects Jira Data Center.

Note: this does not affect Jira Cloud.

Custom Report to pull Custom Properties with Data

A customer had a list of custom properties on the requirement artifact. Some of these custom properties on some requirement had data filled in. When they pulled a report of these requirements, some of these empty custom properties took up much of the report space. So, the customer wondered about reporting only those non-empty custom properties on the artifact. This article explains how this can be achieved.

Deleting the Sample Users in Spira (for versions 6.4 and earlier)

Sometimes you want to delete the sample users in SpiraTest, SpiraTeam or SpiraPlan. This article explains the steps for doing this.

You can manage and delete all sample data from the "Manage Sample Data" system admin page. 

If this page is not available (for instance you are on a version older than 6.5) you can delete the sample data manually. 

Executing SQL Database Queries from Rapise

Sometimes when you are running Rapise tests you need to run direct database queries to prepare the data in the test application, or you need to make queries against the database to verify that some user interactions left the data in a specific state.

The sample script below illustrates how you can call database queries directly from the Rapise scripting editor:

Integration with Jira Cloud/Server - Atlassian has depreciated use of passwords

When you are integrating Spira with Jira cloud (hosted by Atlassian) and Jira server (locally hosted) you need to to connect to Jira using a login and Jira API Key. Previously (prior to June 3rd, 2019) you could also use a Jira login and password, that is no longer allowed by Atlassian.

Using SpiraTeam Data Synchronization with TFS on a 64-bit system

SpiraTeam is designed to work on both 32-bit and 64-bit systems, taking advantage of the extra memory and power available if you have a 64-bit operating system. However Microsoft's Team Foundation Server (TFS) - part of Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) - only runs in 32-bit mode. Therefore when using our integration there are a couple of steps you need to perform.

"Column does not allow NULLS" system error after upgrading to v6.8

After upgrading to v6.8, you may get a system error with the text in it that states that the task can not be completed. This can affect creating users, copying Products, creating new Products, among other activities.

Purging out Large Batches of Old Automated Test Runs in SpiraTest

We had a customer that was looking for a way to easily purge out a large set of older automated test runs that were no longer needed in their project to free up space.

There is not currently a built-in tool to do this, but we thought it might be useful to provide a way to do it using a SQL Server Agent Job.

Integration with Jira - Basic auth with password is not allowed on this instance

If you are integrating Spira (SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, or SpiraPlan) with Atlassian Jira, you may get this error message if you have not updated the integration for a while:

Basic auth with password is not allowed on this instance

Links in Jira to Spira no longer visible in new Jira UI

One of the features of the Spira synchronization service for Atlassian Jira is that it automatically adds relevant links to the user story and issue pages in Jira to make it easier to navigate from Jira back to SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, or SpiraPlan. Some users have reported these links are no longer visible.

Connecting to PostgreSQL from Rapise

If you need to connect Database object to PostgreSQL database follow these simple steps.

Connecting to MySQL from Rapise

If you need to connect Database object to MySQL database follow these simple steps.

Tuning SQL Server Databases using SQL Engine Tuning Advisor

The SQL Server Database Engine Tuning Advisor examines how queries are processed in the databases you specify, and then recommends how you can improve query processing performance by modifying database structures such as indexes, indexed views, and partitioning. This can be used by on-premise customers to improve the performance of their Spira and KronoDesk instances.

Installing Spira or KronoDesk with a large SQL Server model database size

When you are installing SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, SpiraPlan or KronoDesk on a database server with a large 'model' database sometimes the install will fail because the initial Spira/KronoDesk database is not large enough to contain your model database. This article provides the solution

Extracting the tickets and attachments from a KronoDesk cloud instance

Sometimes customers want to download their list of tickets and file attachments. This article explains how to read the data that we provide.

How to migrate or downgrade a SQL Server database to a lower version

This post shows you how you can migrate or downgrade a SQL Server database from one version to a lower or earlier one. E.g. 2016 to 2014, 2014 to 2012, 2012 to 2008 etc. This can be useful if you maintain a heterogeneous environment of SQL Server instances and you have a backup from a newer version that needs to be hosted onto an older version. This happens to us quite a bit when customers installed a trial on SQL Server Express (latest version) and we need to host it on one our cloud servers.

Writing data to an Excel spreadsheet

In this article we describe how to write data to an external Excel spreadsheet during test playback. Both RVL and JavaScript examples are given.

SpiraTest - GitLab Integration, What Synchronizes?

When you use SpiraTest with GitLab, the synchronization plugin synchronizes some fields unidirectionally and other fields bidirectionally. To clarify the details, this article illustrates which fields are synched and in which directions.

How To Build A Custom Data Sync Solution

We provide the source code for a number of the data sync solutions we provide (eg Jira). This gives customers the ability to tweak the precise behavior of the sync to their specific business needs. The open source code does not run in isolation and this article explains how to make sure you have everything you need to build and test your custom code.

Anonymizing Users To Ensure Data Privacy

Sometimes you create user accounts in SpiraTeam for real users to login and test the system. For example you may have a UAT (user acceptance testing) phase, or a crowdsourced testing event (like our Software Testing Bowl). You then want to turn over the data to a third party supplier, but you need to anonymize the users' personal information

Mapping Spira Requirements to Test Steps in Bulk Using Excel and Rapise

Of the unique needs of a requirements and test management system when working in the Defense industry, specifically when designing, building, and testing mission systems, is the ability to link individual test steps to the requirements. Since v5 of SpiraTest, this has been possible inside the Spira user interface, however many customers have been looking for a way to map test steps to requirements in bulk using Excel.

List Files from Folder in RVL

Sometimes it is required to have list of files from some folder. Here we demonstrate how to get this list and how to iterate through it in RVL.

Using RVL Loop to generate sequence of file names

We show how to do data generation for test scenario using RVL Variable loop in Rapise. This sample shows how to produce a sequence of filenames: FILE1.txt, FILE2.txt, FILE3.txt and so on.

Best Practices for Configuring Microsoft SQL Server for use with SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, and KronoDesk

When you install SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, SpiraPlan, or KronoDesk on premise, you have a choice in different ways to configure SQL Server. Every situation is different, but this article presents some recommendations.

Rebuilding the Database Indexes - Advanced Version

With the latest version of SpiraTest, SpiraPlan and SpiraTeam, we have provided a simple button in the Data Tools section that lets you rebuild the database indexes using the same script that we published in KB10. However sometimes the database is so large that the execution takes longer than the 30 minutes allowed by the application, or you want more control over the fragmentation levels that trigger a rebuild. This article provides guidance and a more advanced script for power users.

Using Rapise to populate data in an Excel Spreadsheet
The built-in Spreadsheet object in Rapise makes it easy to read data from an MS-Excel spreadsheet. What happens if you want to write data back to the Excel sheet?