CLM 2012 is coming. Are you ready?

Well, I know it’s been a while since my last post.  Sorry, but it sure has been a busy year for me as a Jazz Jumpstart team member.  Last year at this time, I was busy testing the upgrade to CLM 2011 and helping our User Assistance team put out the best documentation possible.  The Jazz Jumpstart team also released a great workshop to help folks learn how to upgrade to CLM 2011:  https://jazz.net/library/article/662

So, what am I up to now?  I’m busy testing and helping to document the upgrade to CLM 2012, of course.  I started thinking that there are things CLM customers could be doing now to get ready to upgrade to CLM 2012.  Why not blog about it?  So here goes…..

Review the CLM 2012 System Requirements

https://jazz.net/wiki/bin/view/Main/CLMWorkbenchSystemRequirements

Review the upgrade process

The Jazz.net development wiki contains some drafts of the upgrade process.  Review it to start getting familiar with the process.  Remember that this is all pre-release and subject to change.  The official upgrade process will be in the 4.0 infocenter.

https://jazz.net/wiki/bin/edit/Main/CLM301x40UpgradeDistributed

Start preparing a test environment for upgrade testing

This is still a good idea even though the upgrade process this year is much easier.  Here is a way to get started:  Staging a test environment for the upgrade process

Once you have a test environment set up, try it out the process with one of the 4.0 release candidates:  Download 4.0 RC3

Configure a data warehouse if you haven’t already

When you first upgraded to CLM 2011, you may have skipped configuring a DW.  Plan to configure a DW so that you can begin taking advantage of the CLM reporting features.  And, when you upgrade to CLM 2012, you will be able to avoid running JTS setup altogether.  Read this topic for assistance:  Configuring the DW after running JTS setup

Upgrade to the latest fixpack

Do some research on the IBM support portal pr the Jazz.net website and figure out if you should upgrade to the latest fixpack of the CLM applications you are running in your deployment.  The latest fixpack is v3.0.1.3 for RTC, RQM and RRC.  It’s easy to upgrade to the latest fixpack of CLM 2011.   Read this topic for assistance:  Upgrading to version 3.0.1 fixpack releases

Welcome to my Blog!

Hello.

Since I have joined the IBM Jazz Jumpstart team, I’ve been encouraged to start this blog.  This will give me the opportunity to share tips and tricks with you that will help you make the best use of IBM Rational’s Jazz suite of products.  In particular, I am excited about the upcoming release of our Collaborative Lifecycle Management (CLM) solution, version 3.0.1.  You can get more information and get just as excited by visiting the central location for ‘all things Jazz’:  a.k.a Jazz.net. This new release will simplify the way Rational Team Concert, Rational Quality Manager and Rational Requirements Composer (the 3 original Jazz-based products) work together to help teams improve their productivity across the application lifecycle.

My initial focus will be on the following topics: Upgrade, RRC v3.0.1 new features and the Reporting capabilities built-in to the CLM solution.