Source Control for WebCatalog Objects

The FlexDeploy OTBI solution allows developers to either source the WebCatalog objects from a development OTBI instance or from a source control system. To source control WebCatalog objects there are two main practices that must be followed.

First, the web catalog objects stored in source control must maintain the same directory structure as the OTBI WebCatalog.  The root path in your source control repository can be anything, but the directory structure under it must exactly match that of the WebCatalog. For example, notice the WebCatalog path for the report below:




The path above must match the path in the source control system as we see below. 



For above example, FlexDeploy project source configuration will be configured with "Oracle Transactional BI/shared/Custom/Financials" as the sparse folder when using Git. This would ensure that all objects under that folder will be discovered as WebCatalog objects and file path starts with /shared/Custom which matches the WebCatalog path in OTBI.

Secondly, the files stored in source control should be named with the following extensions corresponding to the object type.  The extensions are important to both ensure the deployment operation is handled correctly, and to make it easier to identify and search for these objects in FlexDeploy.

OTBI Type NameOTBI Signature / Composite Signature*Source Control Extension
ActionactionAction
Agentcoibot1Agent
Analysisqueryitem1Analysis
Columncosavedcolumn1Column
Conditioncondition1Condition
Dashboarddashboardfolder1Dashboard
Data Model.xdm *Data Model
Dashboard Promptglobalfilteritem1Dashboard Prompt
Filterfilteritem1Filter
Groupcustomgroup1Group
KPIkpi1KPI
KPI Watchlistscorecardkpiwatchlist1KPI Watchlist
Report.xdo *Report
Scorecardscorecard1Scorecard
Style Template.xss *Style Template
Visual Analyzer Projectsprojectfolder1Visual Analyzer Projects

The OTBI signature can be viewed by hovering over the  icon on the OTBI WebCatalog Manager's properties for a catalog object (see image above).

The manual process of ensuring folder structure and files extensions can be cumbersome when managed manually.  See Automate check-in of development OTBI catalog items to SCM for details on more effectively manage.

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