Configuring the Relationship Service

In the Relationship Service tab, you configure settings for the SBM Relationship Service, which enables you to view and analyze relationships between items in separate applications.

Serena recommends that you wait to start the SBM Relationship Service on the Manage Services tab until after you have finished promoting all of the Release Manager process apps. (This service does not start automatically when you click Apply to finish the configuration process.) The initial loading that begins when the service starts consumes server resources and takes time to complete; therefore, start the service after you promote the apps in order to allow the promotion process to complete as quickly as possible.

The Relationship Service and database are installed on the server that hosts SBM Common Services. Therefore, there is only one active Relationship Service instance per SBM instance.

The Status section displays the current status and activity of the Relationship Service. For example, if you have never started the SBM Relationship Service on the Manage Services tab, the Relationship Service database is empty and not in use. That information is reported in the status section. After you start the service and the initial loading of data begins, the status is updated.

In the Database Server Settings section, enter the HTTP port that will be used to connect to the Relationship Service database. The default port value is 7474.

In the Database Settings section, configure the following settings:

• Confirm or change the Database location that hosts the Relationship Service database. This database stores the relationships that exist between items in separate applications. Click Change to specify a different directory. The Change database location dialog box contains the following options:
  • Copy existing database to this location – After the initial load is finished, and the database has been successfully created, you can select this option to copy the database to another location (for example, if the size of the database requires that you specify a different directory). You must click Apply to begin the actual copy process.
  • Start new initial load in this location – Select this option to initialize a new loading process in another location. You must click Apply to begin the actual loading process.
  • Use existing database in this location – Select this option to enter the location of an existing Relationship Service database. In this scenario, the initial load is not performed again; instead, after the Relationship service is started the existing database is used.
  Important: Serena recommends that you maintain a one-to-one relationship between the Relationship Service database and the SBM Application Engine database. This means that if you connect to a different SBM Application Engine database, you should also change the Database location for the Relationship Service database. This ensures that the same Relationship Service database is not used with multiple SBM Application Engine databases, and that each SBM Application Engine database has its own corresponding Relationship Service database.
• Enter a Backup Location for the Relationship Service database.
  Tip: Once the backup database folder has been created, consider saving it to another server or separate partition in order to safely preserve your data.
• Click Backup Now to create a backup copy of the database immediately in the directory that you specify.
  Tip: Use this option if you need to create a backup of the database folder and move it to a new machine. For example, if you decide to create a cluster for SBM Common Services and as a result, you need to migrate the Relationship Service database to a new server, use the Backup Now option to create a backup of the directory that you need to move.
• Click Schedule to open the Scheduler window and configure the backup frequency.