Design Time Repository 

Purpose

The Design Time Repository (DTR) is a repository that provides file versioning. All design time objects or sources are stored and versioned centrally. It is used at SAP's customers' and partners' sites as well as in SAP's own development.

The DTR provides state of the art tool support for source code management. Due to its clear separation of DTR client and server part, DTR combines the flexibility and speed of a local file system with the scalability and reliability of a server application.

The DTR server exposes a hierarchical file system via standard DeltaV and WebDAV access protocols to the DTR client. It manages versioning of your resources and supports concurrent changes of the same resource in the same repository by different users. It provides an infrastructure for managing distributed and large-scale application development that includes mechanisms to propagate resource changes between repositories including change management.

Implementation Considerations

You use the DTR in two situations:

·        When you want to develop your own applications in the SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio.

·        When you want to modify a Java application delivered by SAP. Due to the automatic conflict detection of the DTR, your modifications will not be overwritten automatically during updates; instead, with the DTR you will be able to merge your modification with the new version easily.

Integration

The DTR client is part of the SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio. The procedures described here reflect all options offered by the DTR. Many repetitive steps are described out of the DTR perspective. The most frequently used functions for the daily work of the developer – who usually works in other perspectives of the SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio – can be found in the context menus of the other perspectives.

Features

The DTR provides mechanisms for managing large-scale multi-user Java application development that is distributed across geographical locations; it is based on access via files and folders. It supports development landscapes with multiple repositories, where resources and changes can be propagated between these repositories. As a repository for versioned file storage, the DTR provides:

·        Storage independent of file type

·        Comfortable check-in/check-out mechanisms

·        High performance through adaptive delta storage of files – only files currently in use are stored as full versions, all other versions are stored as delta; they are restored in case they are needed again.

·        Comfortable upload mechanisms, to allow saving resources on the server without checking them in

Key features of configuration management and distributed development support include the ability to:

·        Manage different versions of a development resource in the same repository

·        Manage multiple states of a software component by modifiable workspaces and fixed baselines

·        Organize development objects in hierarchical workspace folders containing workspaces

·        Manage concurrent modifications done by multiple users on the same resource through concurrency control

·        Tracking changes in activities and grouping modifications into logical transactional units

·        Manage distributed development of the same resource in different workspaces, which may reside in the same repository or in different repositories present in different geographical locations.

·        Automatically detect conflicts between "competing" versions of a file in one or more workspaces – even across repository boundaries – through a global version history that is transported together with the file content

The propagation management features provide fast and safe change management across workspace and physical repository boundaries:

·        Sequence-independent propagation of changes between workspaces even across physical repository boundaries

·        Automatic detection of conflicts between imported changes and modifications done in your local workspace

·        Tool support for resolving these conflicts, for example, by merging the imported changes with your modifications

These key features of DTR considerably reduce development time and costs. You get even more benefits through its integration with the SAP Java IDE, which provides a complete infrastructure for the Java development.