Application catalogue - solution design

We will create the page, that we have introduced as our vision in the solution requirements, with following steps in ObjectGears:

1. Underlying data that will be displayed
2. Page object that will display the data
3. Scheme objects and other objects that we want to display from buttons in the Application catalogue

1. Underlying data

Data, that we want to display in the Application catalogue (Name of the application, Description, Guarantor etc.), most probably are already present in the Configuration database CMDB. All the necessary data are included in the below data model. If some data are missing, we will extend the model with necessary data. We have to decide whether we want to localize some data or not. Name of the application group will be probably good to display based on user localization (e.g. Graphic tools, Grafische Werkzeuge...), but other will be fixed (Name of the application, Description of the application).

2. Page object that will display the data

We will create a record of a usual ObjectGears page, which we will mark as Hide ObjectGears appearance and Public page, and further we will set access to it to All users or All authenticated users, as needed. The page can then have its authentic look and will not display to users neither ObjectGears menu nor toolbars with search, buttons and other ObjectGears functions. The page should be displayed by all the users not just those with an ObjectGears account.

We will let a web designer to develop the page look and html coder to create the page template according to it. The coder will provide us with two files. One with a JavaScript (.js), dealing with building the whole page, its elements and functionalities and one with Cascading Style Sheets, dealing with formatting and page elements appearance.

Then we will insert a single webpart (type Script) into our ObjectGears page, that will read the underlying data from classes and display them in the template from the html coder. Interactivity of the Application catalogue will be managed on client. Data reading will be managed by Script call. The logic itself will be moved to the Script block, that will be called from the Script call. The Script block will use caching in order the list of applications is not read from the database again and again. Cache clearing will be managed by rules that we will create in the class with applications and which will respond to any creation, change or deletion of an application record.

3. Objects displayed by buttons

We have to add to buttons actions with objects that we have already present in the application in most cases. Buttons should be displayed only if the user possesses corresponding permissions in order users can really perform and finish the given actions.

1. Create an incident related to the displayed application - the button opens a new record for an incident and fills in the given application from the Application catalogue
2. Request application installation - the button opens a new record of a request for installation and fills in the given application from the Application catalogue
3. Display Configuration item (detailed record of data displayed in the Application catalogue) - the button displayes details of the given record
4. Display scheme of application components, interfaces and infrastructure for running the application - the button displays the given scheme and passes to it the application for which the scheme should be displayed
5. Display scheme of processes supported by the application - the button displays the given scheme and passes to it the application for which the scheme should be displayed
6. Display documentation related to the application - the button displays the given article in the documentation. The page displaying the articles will receive a variable that will lead to displaying the respective article.