Working with Attributes

Attributes are user-defined fields and values that let you extend the definition of Certify components and allow you to categorize, collect, sort, and extract data. For example, you may want to track a build number. To accomplish this task, create an attribute titled Build Number and populate the field with values when creating or editing the attribute. You may also want to extract attribute data for reporting needs.

All projects in a given database share attributes. For example, when you create an attribute for a process, this attribute is available to all processes in the database.

Attributes can be added to:

Requirements
Layouts
Processes
Results

You can create an unlimited number of attributes and set an attribute as required. Required attributes are only enforced when creating or editing an existing variable, process, layout, recordset, requirement, or test result that has attributes associated with it. Required attributes appear with an asterisk to the right of the attribute name in dialogs and Attributes tabs. The following example explains the enforcement concept.

Example: New Attribute, Existing Processes

You have created 1,000 processes. You now want to create an attribute for processes that requires a build number when running the process. You create the attribute and mark it as required, but give it no default value. You open a project and run one of the processes in the project. The attribute is not required.

Same scenario, but this time you open a project and add another step to the process. Because you edited the process, the attribute is required, and a message appears stating that you must supply a value when running the process.