Siebel - 5.3


Extension ID

com.castsoftware.siebel

What’s new?

See Release Notes.

Description

This extension provides support for Siebel.

In what situation should you install this extension?

The Siebel Analyzer has been designed mostly for its quality model inspired by customer best practices as well as Siebel review checklists. Hence it fulfils the CAST Dashboard use-case.

Supported Versions of Siebel

This extension provides support for the following Siebel versions:

Siebel version Supported Comments
7.5
7.7
7.8
8.0
8.1.x.x
15.x (8.1.1.15/8.2.2.15, IP 2015) New functionalities or syntax introduced in these versions are NOT supported, but this does not affect the results.
16.x (IP 2016) New functionalities or syntax introduced in these versions are NOT supported, but this does not affect the results.
IP 2017
IP 2018
IP 2019
20.x
21.x
22.x
New functionalities or syntax introduced in these versions are NOT supported, but this does not affect the results.

Limitation starting from 17.x (IP 2017): The Siebel Analyzer can ONLY extract from Siebel repositories that do NOT have the Workspace option enabled. If you attempt to run an extraction on a repository with the Workspace option enabled, the following error will be logged in the extractor log when using Siebel ≥ 5.3.2:

Validation error #-5: Repository ID <ID> contains multiple workspaces in the schema <schema>

If the Workspace option is enabled and you wish to perform an extraction, then you must apply the flattening process before you run the extraction, as per the following third-party documentation: https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E88140_01/books/UsingTools/using_workspaces39.html#wp1013245external link.
23.x and above likely* New functionalities or syntax introduced in these versions are NOT supported, but this does not affect the results.

In addition to the Workspace limitation described previously: * The Siebel repository tables “S_” are stable and have not changed for quite some time. As such, the extractor will likely extract the objects and links as expected, and the rest of the analysis process will complete without issue.

Function Point, Quality and Sizing support

  • Function Points (transactions): a green tick indicates that OMG Function Point counting and Transaction Risk Index are supported
  • Quality and Sizing: a green tick indicates that CAST can measure size and that a minimum set of Quality Rules exist
Function Points (transactions) Quality and Sizing

Compatibility

Release Operating System Supported
≥ v3.3 / ≥ 8.4.3 Microsoft Windows / Linux
v2 / ≥ 8.3.39 Microsoft Windows

Supported DBMS servers for Siebel applications

The extension supports Siebel applications installed on the following DBMS:

DBMS Supported
Oracle Server
DB2 UDB
Microsoft SQL Server

Prerequisites

Legacy scan mode in v2 only (tick) Fast scan mode is NOT supported in v2 - therefore ensure you are using legacy scan mode.

Vanilla repository availability

(tick)

Please ensure that the Vanilla repository is online and available before starting.

Note that the Vanilla repository must have the same Siebel version as the Project repository, and same series of Siebel patches.

On the Siebel server hosting the Oracle/DB2/Microsoft SQL Server repository (for Vanilla and Project)

(tick)
  • The server can be any OS, however Unix/Linux OS may require some .ksh script if you want to run the extractor on the server machine itself. 
  • The version of the Oracle/DB2/Microsoft SQL Server server must match a version supported by the JDBC driver embedded in the CAST Database Extractor (used to extract the SQL data). This is different and wider than the supported versions for a participating database. Note that versions supported by Imaging/AIP Core for a participating databases can be found in SQL - Covered technologies.
  • Make sure that the Siebel schema statistics are up-to-date (if not up-to-date, some queries in the extractor may not finish in reasonable times (especially the first one)). To update them, run the following:
Oracle

Update the schema with the following SQL statement (requires some privileges : GRANT execute ON dbms_stats TO XXX):

Execute dbms_stats.gather_schema_stats(ownname => 'MY_SIEBEL_SCHEMA', estimate_percent => dbms_stats.auto_sample_size, method_opt => 'for all columns size auto', cascade => true); 
DB2 UDB Check if the DB2 automatic runstats and DB2 real time statistics are enabled. If not, ask the DBA to run "db2 reorgchk update statistics on table all" or similar.
Microsoft SQL Server Not required.
  • Identify the USER that will be used for extraction:
    • On Oracle, the required privileges for the USER used to perform the extraction are: GRANT SELECT on all S_ tables
    • On DB2 UDB, the minimum roles and permissions for an extract is as follow : READ access on all S_ tables, connect to database permission.
    • On Microsoft SQL Server, the required privileges for the USER used to perform the extraction are: GRANT SELECT on all S_ tables.

On server used for extraction (where the CAST Database Extractor is deployed)

(tick)
  • Windows or Linux (Unix/Linux OS may require some additional .ksh scripts). 
  • JRE 1.7 (ideally 64 bit version to allow for a JVM large heap size).
  • Minimum 1.2 GB RAM memory free, more if available.
  • Extractor location:
    • Ideally, install the extractor on the RDBMS server itself.
    • Alternatively on a machine with:
      • very good bandwidth (1 GB/s) to the DBMS server (some remote extractions fail due to poor VPN bandwidth)
      • connectivity to the DBMS server (required ports open)
  • 4 GB free disk space (for temporary files before compression)
  • 250 MB free disk space (to store the two extraction archives) included in above requirement.
  • When using the standalone CAST Database Extractor to extract the SQL data (instead of using the extractors built into the CAST Delivery Manager Tool) you should download the extractor here: https://extend.castsoftware.com/#/extension?id=com.castsoftware.aip.extractor.sqldatabase&version=latest

On Node used for analysis

(tick)
  • 2 GB RAM memory free (for analysis/snapshot)
  • Connectivity to the CAST Storage Service/PostgreSQL instance server hosting the application schemas (port open)
  • 5-10 GB free disk space (to store the source code, once expanded by the Deploy phase)
  • Disable anti-virus software. Check that no anti-virus is running on the workstation or disable real-time scan for the work folders (delivery & deploy folders + temp folders). Failure to do so will multiply the injection runtime.

On CAST Storage Service/PostgreSQL instance used for analysis

(tick)

Disk space requirements

Disk space depends on the Siebel version implemented by the customer:

Siebel version Vanilla _LOCAL Project _LOCAL Project _CENTRAL _MNGT UNDO and TEMP Source Code Total consumed Total required at peak time
8.x 5 GB 7 GB 2 GB 0.256 GB 23 GB + 10 GB (maybe due to other analyses) 5.98 GB 49 GB 100 GB
7.8 2.5 GB 3 GB 0.8 GB 0.256 GB TBD or see above. 5.21 GB 30-35 GB 50 GB

Disk speed requirements

Siebel analysis incurs heavy disk usage. Disk I/O throughput (not necessarily speed) is possibly the most important factor to determine the analysis time. So far we have tested three environments with the tool iometer, following this how-to. The rough results are these:

  • DELL laptop, 1 disk 7500rpm. Iometer reports around 3 MB/s. Analysis times +20 hours.
  • HP desktop, 2 disks 10000rpm. Iometer reports around 5 MB/s in one of the disks. Analysis time 10 hours (sources in one disk, oracle datafiles in another disk).
  • DELL workstation, 4 disks 10000rpm in a RAID5 configuration. Iometer reports around 150MB/s. Analysis time 4 hours (since this is a very performant disk configuration, CPU time is possibly part of the bottleneck. This means it would be hard to further reduce analysis time, unless switching to other costlier technology, like SSD drive).

Tables required to grant access to the Siebel repository

(tick)

The following database tables are accessed during the Siebel extraction process: SIEBEL_TABLES.txt.

FAQs

Please see PeopleSoft & Siebel FAQ for more information.

Download, installation, configuration and operating instructions

See Onboarding with CAST Imaging.

What results can you expect?

Objects

The objects listed below are all the object types that a Siebel analysis will deliver in the Analysis Service. With these objects, CAST is capable of supporting a set of quality rules to provide a customer with a good overview of the current technical status of a Siebel application. It is not the intention of CAST to capture all details and syntaxes; a coupling between requirement and detection is made.

Click to enlarge or download it here:

The Siebel extension is capable of detecting a large number of objects, properties and links. All of these artifacts are mentioned in the picture above, but in essence, all Siebel objects are supported:

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Application
Siebel Screen
Siebel View
Siebel Business Objects

Applets

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Applet - Association List
Siebel Applet - Detail
Siebel Applet - MVG
Siebel Applet - NULL
Siebel Applet - Pick List
Siebel Applet - Playbar
Siebel Applet - Standard
Siebel Applet - Task

Business Component

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Business Component

Table

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Table Data (Intersection)
Siebel Table Data (Private)
Siebel Table Data (Public)
Siebel Table Dictionary
Siebel Table Extension
Siebel Table Extension (Siebel)
Siebel Table External
Siebel Table External View
Siebel Table Interface
Siebel Table Log
Siebel Table Repository
Siebel Table Virtual Table
Siebel Table Warehouse
Siebel Table Unkown Type

Web Template

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - Chart
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - Form
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - Grid Layout
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - List
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - Specialized
Siebel Web Template - Applet Template - Tree
Siebel Web Template - View Template
Siebel Web Template - Web Page Template

Class

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Class - ActiveX Control
Siebel Class - Applet
Siebel Class - Business Component
Siebel Class - Document
Siebel Class - Java Applet
Siebel Class - Report
Siebel Class - Search
Siebel Class - Service

Misc

Icon Metamodel description
Siebel Link
Siebel Picklist
Siebel Web Page

Structural rules

The following structural rules are provided:

You can find a global list here: https://technologies.castsoftware.com/AIP/technologies/1520000external link.

Known issues/limitations

The following section lists all known issues/limitations in this release of the extension.

Unable to establish a connection while performing the database repository extraction

Situation

When attempting to extract the Siebel database repositories (Vanilla or Project) via the standalone CAST Database Extractorexternal link using the Siebel-Extract-CLI.bat batch file.

Symptoms

An error similar to the following is logged, stopping the extraction process:

Unable to establish a connection to: jdbc:oracle:thin:@<ip>:1521:<instance> => The Network Adapter could not establish the connection.

Workaround

The workaround to this issue involves manually adding a specific Java runtime option (-Djava.net.preferIPv4Stack=true) and then attempting to rerun the database extraction. Add the specific Java option to the Siebel-Extract-CLI.bat batch file at line 163, immediately after %JAVA_EXE%:

Error when displaying source code in the CAST dashboards

Most Siebel objects don’t have associated source code as they correspond to a configuration (example: an applet). In the CAST dashboards an error will therefore be displayed when trying to display the object source code (example error message from the legacy CAST Engineering Dashboard):

No bookmarks are displayed for violations in source code in CAST dashboards

When using the CAST dashboards, no “bookmarks” will be displayed to indicate where violations occur in source code. This is a limitation of the Siebel extension.

Miscellaneous information

This section explains various miscellaneous information that is important to understand.

Running a CAST AIP upgrade or an Extension upgrade

This note is valid in the following situations:

  • Updating to a new Imaging/AIP Core release (major/minor or Service Pack)
  • Updating to a new release of any extension (not limited to an update of the Siebel extension)

When any of the above actions are performed, the Siebel custom tables located in the VANILLA_SCHEMA will be recreated and all data will be overwritten and lost. In this situation, you MUST run a new analysis on the Vanilla application to re-populate the custom tables (used for the discrimination step during the Project snapshot generation) before you run the Project analysis/snapshot.