Will the upcoming Innovator 12 edit concept lead to tons of nonsense revisions?

Hi,

I think this one is a good topic for a Community discussion.

I have seen the Aras Innovator 12 demo at ACE Europe 2018. One upcoming UX enhancement is a simplified way to edit an Item. I really like the new concept, but I wonder if it will eliminate the ability to overwrite existing generations when using the automatic revision mode.

Let´s assume we have an Item with Versioning Disciple “Automatic”. Typical use cases are Methods, Workflows but maybe also the standard Parts or Documents.
As long as you have locked an Item, the existing Item generation will be overwritten while editing. The current “Lock” helps to prevent that every little change leads to a new Item revision.

But as far as I have understand the demo, “Lock” will be removed in the upcoming Innovator version.
Of course we have the option to choose by our self, if we want to use Automatic or Manuel revision mode. But especially for core ItemTypes, it isn´t wise to change the revision mode.

What does the new edit concept mean for the automatic revision mode? Will we now get tons of nonsense revisions?

I am already looking forward to your opinion! And I hope Aras will correct me if I got things totally wrong.

Best regards!
Angela

  • I didn´t have seen it before, but today during transferring data from test system to a main instance. My assumption above was unfortunately true. 

    In Innovator 12 it´s not possible anymore to leave an open lock. Especially in Methods you are always forced to create a new version of a Method, even if you just accidentally closed the window. The claim flag is always erased automatically.

    Is it somehow possible to keep the claim flag active? 

  • Hi community,

    I have to share my own disbelieve about the current Aras Release notes regarding Innovator 17:

    https://www.aras.com/-/media/files/documentation/release-notes/en/14-0-0/aras-innovator-17---release-notes.ashx

    I wrote the above post two years ago. Innovator 12 wasn´t released yet and I just had seen a short demo. Already at this time I knew that the lock behavior will make trouble as it produces a lot of unwanted revisions. But nobody had listened.

    And now the unthinkable happened! Aras improved it! The release notes of Innovator 17 contains this piece of text which is shocking similar to my above description:

    Quote:

    [...]Previously, setting an item to “Edit” mode also claimed the item. Now, setting an item to “Edit” mode does not claim the item. [...]

    [...]This provides users with greater control over item lock status.[...]

    [...]Especially for automatically versionable items, this capability can be used to prevent the creation of excess automatic versions, preserving the business meaning of versions.[....]

    I can´t believe it! I was right all the time!

    I just write this post to share these two important messages: 

    1. I told you so ! Stuck out tongue closed eyes 
    2. Feast upon my magnificence!!!Grin

    That´s an excellent start. Now I hope Aras will add my many other improvements ideas that I have submitted. It´s unbelievable just my patience suddenly pays off. 

    Angela

     

  • Additional remarks: I especially like how they translated my term "nonsense revisions" to "preserving the business meaning of versions." . That´s my favorite part in the release notes!

    And TechDoc image drag'n'drop which finally replaces the shabby community project I once created to improve exactly THAT: https://github.com/AngelaIp/aras-image-uploader-for-tech-docs

    And I like Client certificates. 

    It´s really unbelievable.

  • Good on you Angela, thank you for your dedication and commitment to Aras......you see 'they' are listening!

  • Leaving a door open is now impossible in Innovator 12. In Methods in particular, you are compelled to always generate a fresh Version of a Method, even if you merely closed the window by accident. At all times, the claim flag is automatically removed. geometry dash breeze 

  • There is actually a better solution available. Just deactivate the Automatic versioning in the Method ItemType! This way you always overwrite the current version and can create new version on demand by some relationship action. 

    That´s the Method I right now currently use in ALL Innovators I work on (I have a script to set it automatically on new instances). I even spent the time to cleanup all unnecessary method generations. Using manual versioning has the risk that you actually destroy Methods when you don´t pay attention, but that´s what backups and test servers are for. This way I can even add a revision history to the Method that actually matches the Method generation which truly ensure to "preserve the business meaning of versions". Sunglasses