Razor administration via Razor Admin

With the Windows NT version of Razor, you have two interfaces available in administering your installation; the "traditional" UNIX scripts or the Razor Admin tool. If you are a prior Razor UNIX administrator and are comfortable with the scripts, you can stick with that administration method. You still should read through "Razor administration via scripts" on page 325 as it contains differences unique to WindowsNT under the POSIX subsystem.

The rest of this section describes how to administer Razor using the Razor Admin tool. From this one tool, you can update your Razor license keys, create databases and groups, bring the license manager and database server up and down, and monitor users and connections.

Starting Razor Admin

To start the Razor Admin tool, select "Razor Admin" from the Razor program group and you will see a window similar to the one shown below:

The main display

The main display of the Razor Admin tool consists of a window header/footer, a menu bar, a database control area, and a license manager control area.

Menu bar

The menu bar contains the menus Database, Group, License, View, and Help.

• Database contains the database-related commands New, Select, Connections, Server Up, Server Down, and Exit.
• Group¹ contains new file and issue group-related commands.
• License contains license manager-related commands such as Manager Up, Manager Down, Connections, Razor ID, Version, Keys, Info, and Remote Users.
• View contains window controls to show/hide the Status Bar and Output Log.

Footer bar

The footer bar contains tool tips, current time, and Razor version.

Database control

The Database control area permits the selection of a database to administer and shows the current license token usage for that database.

License manager control

The License manager control area permits starting/stopping the license manager and shows the total license token usage.

Installing license keys

In order for Razor to run, you must now obtain and install some license keys. Demo keys may be obtained automatically via Tower's Web site at http://www.tower.com/keys.html. Demo keys will permit you approximately three weeks to evaluate Razor. If you have problems or do not have access to the Internet, contact Tower Concepts either via e-mail at "licenses@tower.com" or by phone at (315) 363-8000.

Permanent keys are obtained directly from Tower Concepts. To get the keys, you will need to provide the Razor identification for the machine that will be hosting the Razor license manager. Follow the steps below to provide Tower Concepts with the appropriate information required for licensing your machine.²

• Select Razor ID from the License menu. A pop-up window will appear, like the one below, with the Razor ID information required by Tower Concepts in order to generate license keys.
  
  
  
• Send the full output of this command to `licenses@tower.com' requesting license keys. If you are demoing Razor, you can generate your own temporary license keys via Tower's Web site at http://www.tower.com/keys.html.
• Once you receive the license keys from Tower Concepts, select Keys from the License menu. You will see a License Keys dialog like the one below. Take care to enter the keys correctly and with the correct case. Click OK to enter the new keys.
  
  
  

Creating Razor databases

• To create a database, select New from the Database menu. A New Database dialog will be shown.
  
  
  Select the location of the database by using the Database Location button. This will bring up an Explorer dialog that will allow you to choose the path where the database will reside - which MUST be an NTFS file system.
• Enter a database name (no spaces or funny characters please³).
• If you also wish the database to be used for file control, enter a File Group name⁴ (again, no spaces or funny characters please).
• To allow the service to be installed properly the user's passwords must be supplied.

NOTE: Only members of the Admin group may use the Razor Admin tool.

• When you have completed these entries, click OK to create the database.

Within the limits of system resources any number of databases may be created on the Razor host.

Starting Razor

Starting the license manager

• Start the "Razor License Manager" service by clicking on the "Start" button in the License Manager control or select Manager Up from the License menu.
• When the License Manager has been started, you will see "Running - 0 databases connected" in the status message field.

Starting a database

If you have not created a database yet, Creating a database precedes this section. Come back here to start the database once you have created one.

• Click "Select" in the Database control area or select Select from the Database pull-down menu. A Select Database dialog will be displayed similar to the one below.
  
  
  
• Click on the drop-down button and select the appropriate database. It's name will appear in the database drop-down box.
• Click OK. The selected database name will appear in the name field in the Database control area.
• Click the "Start" button to the left of the selected database name or select Server Up from the Database menu.

NOTE: To automatically start the Razor license manager at boot time, refer to "Starting the programs" on page 326, specifically on how to start the database service via the Shortcut to Services.

Razor passwords

Razor passwords can be created and maintained from the Razor Admin tool. Additional information relating to Razor passwords can be found in "Remote client password" on page 45 and "Password functions" on page 158.

To manage Razor passwords, select Remote Users from the License menu. A Remote Users dialog will be displayed like the one below.

NOTE: The Remote Users menu item will only be enabled under the following conditions: the License Manager is running, a database is selected in the Database Control, you are logged in as Administrator, and Administrator is authorized to perform password file updates via the Access_list file.

Of course your display will be empty if you have not created any passwords yet. To add a new user, click the ADD button. A User dialog will appear.




Enter the appropriate information and click OK. Cancel will dismiss the user entry and not create it.

To modify an existing user entry, single click the name in the Remote Users list and click MODIFY. The User information dialog will be displayed. Make the appropriate changes and click OK.

To delete a user entry, single click on the name in the Remote Users list and click DELETE. A confirmation message will appear, allowing you to confirm the user entry deletion.

Creating new groups

Additional issues or file control groups can be added at any time after Razor is installed.

NOTE: The database server must be down before a new group can be added. The Group menu will be inactive while the database server is up. To bring the database server down, simply click the Stop button next to the selected database server name.

To create a new group, select New from the Group menu and select either Issues or File. A sample New Issues Group dialog is shown.




Select the group type from the drop-down menu. Group types are defined by the Razor installation and new groups may be added with new releases. Currently, the issues groups include:

• Default - this is the default issues group, and the one that is created with the script rz_add_issues_group.
• Action_tems - action items related to process-oriented meetings.
• Bug_tracking - issues relating to software problem tracking.
• Customer_tracking - a customer contact database.
• Music - that's right, this just gives you an idea that Razor can be used to track just about anything.
• Peer_Review - generally associated with tracking ISO or other CM-standard review mechanism.
• Support_Helpdesk - a help-desk tracking/follow-up database.
• ToDo - Dorothy's little dog or what you still have to accomplish.

File control groups include:

• Default - this is the default issues group, and the one that is created with the script rz_add_group.
• Code_development - a software-oriented version control group.
• Document_management - oriented towards tracking document changes as opposed to software.
• Web_development - similar to Code development, where the files relate to Web pages.

Finally, enter the group name and Prefix⁵ in the appropriate fields. Click OK to create the group. If the selected group can be customized, an Attribute configuration dialog will appear. The one shown below is for Bug tracking.




Each attribute can be customized by selecting its name from the drop-down list. Each entry can be individually inserted/removed from the Entry selection area, and new ones can be added in the New entry box. To insert or remove an individual entry, highlight it from the list and click the appropriate action button. Clicking Apply will commit the changes and leave the dialog, OK will commit the changes and continue with the group creation, and Restore will restore the original settings.

Administering databases

Database administration includes direct maintenance (editing) of various configuration files within the database hierarchy. These files are, and must remain, in POSIX text format. The Razor shells provide the vi editor but Razor administrators are free to use any editor of their liking as long as the file, once edited, remains in POSIX text format. Use of the vi editor is strongly encouraged since that editor maintains the correct text file format.

¹ This menu item is only enabled when a database is selected and the database is not running.
² New installations will automatically be provided with the required license information via Notepad. This information should be copied to an e-mail and sent to `licenses@tower.com'.
<sup>3</sup> Characters like `, ", <, >, !, ?, $, &, etc, etc.
⁴ A Razor group should not be confused with a UNIX group: they are different beasts. See "Databases, groups, and attributes" on page 31 and "Containers: databases, groups, and folders" on page 183.
⁵ Prefix is a single character mnemonic that will be used in as part of the issue number.