Rules for Item Lifecycles

For item types, you can enable CM rules so that the development of items is subject to the required level of change control and authorization. These rules provide the flexibility to introduce change control on items at whatever stage in the process is most applicable to them.

The rules for item types and their normal lifecycle states are described below. Note that rules are only applicable when the related request is on a normal lifecycle path.

Rule | Description | Sample Scenario
Creation | Requires a request to be specified when creating a new item. When the item is created, it will be related to the request as In Response To. | You need to enforce change control right from the beginning of a project.
New Revision | Specifies the state in the item's lifecycle in which all new item revisions based on the revision at the specified state must be related to a request as In Response To. If you specify the first lifecycle state, this requires every new revision to be related to a request. | You want to enforce change control after a beta release of the project.
Action | Specifies the state in the item's lifecycle in which an item cannot be actioned to the next normal state unless it is related to a request as In Response To. | You want to make sure that only the appropriate revisions progress far enough in their lifecycles to be baselined. You set this rule to catch item revisions from progressing without approval.
Closure | Specifies the state in the item's lifecycle that an item must reach in order for a related request to close. | You do not want to allow a request to be closed while any related item revision has not reached a quality state in its lifecycle.

NOTE For the New Revision and Action rules, a request must be related In Response To, which means that a previous revision of the same item must first be related as Affected. If you cannot fulfill this latter condition, then the Change Manager is allowed to override it when establishing the In Response To relationship.