Collaboration Portal Model Versioning
Definition
Much like Quote models, Collaboration Portal Models are created for a given tenant. The dashboard lists all collaboration models for this tenant.
A collaboration portal model is defined with a Name and a Status:
- The Name is the identifier of the collaboration portal model. It must be unique for a tenant. This name is used by internal and external systems to identify the collaboration quote model (eg. the Collaboration Portal runtime user interface)
- The Status defines the collaboration portal model status:
- DRAFT - A draft version corresponds to a working version. This means that the collaboration portal model is being defined and not available at runtime.
- ACTIVE - An active version corresponds to a version that is available at runtime by the Collaboration Portal and Smart CPQ.
The activation process allows you to change the quote model status from DRAFT to ACTIVE. Once a model is activated, it cannot be updated. However, you can create a new draft version of an active quote model if you need to modify it. See Creating a Draft below.
Active version
For a given collaboration portal model (represented by its name), there is only 1 ACTIVE version.
Creating a Draft
A DRAFT is created when:
- A new collaboration portal model is created
- An ACTIVE collaboration portal model is updated
A DRAFT is available only on the Collaboration Portal Designer side and not available at runtime in Collaborative Quoting & Performance Quoting. Only ACTIVE collaboration portal models are available at runtime.
When a DRAFT is created from an active version, a suffix is added to the quote model name in order to identify the DRAFT (DRAFT (current date time)). In addition, the DRAFT is displayed as a child of the ACTIVE version.
Multiple DRAFT
A collaboration portal model can have up to 3 drafts under an active version. For example, you can work on the next version of your quote model (for a deployment next month for example) but still need to fix something in the current quote model. You will have 1 DRAFT for the next version next year and 1 DRAFT for the fix.
Activation Process
When a quote model is implemented and ready for testing and publishing, you need to activate the draft model.
Activating a DRAFT allows you to publish and actively use it on the live website. The status of the collaboration portal model will be ACTIVE. You can activate a collaboration portal model from the Dashboard or while editing the model with the Activate button displayed in the top right corner.
Collaboration Portal Model validation
Only valid collaboration portal models can be activated. If there are errors or missing selections in the model (displayed in the footer), you must fix them in order to activate the model.
If an active collaboration portal model already exists, the new active version will replace the previous one. The old version is stored as backup.
In order to ACTIVATE a collaboration portal model, you must enter an activation label. This label allows you to identify the version that is activated. In addition, a fingerprint will be generated in order to identify your quote model. This fingerprint is based on the model content. Two identical models deployed in different environments will have the same fingerprint.
The fingerprint is displayed on the Dashboard on ACTIVE quote models. This information can be also retrieved at runtime using the error inspector (under the "Global" tab)
Backup process
If needed, you can reactivate a quote model that was previously ACTIVE. To do this, in the action dropdown list, select History. In the History popup, you can edit a backup version. This creates a new DRAFT of that version that you can activate.
Deployment and Promoting Models Between Environments
In order to manage several environments for your project, tenants are defined for each of them.
In order to deploy a quote model from DEV to TEST, the following steps are needed:
- Export your collaboration portal model from Tenant A (export the ACTIVE version which has been validated)
- Import your collaboration portal model in Tenant B
- Activate the collaboration portal model in Tenant B (Note: The collaboration portal model has mappings and configurations that rely on Quote Models - you must ensure that the quote model you want to use for the Collaboration Portal also exists and is activated in the new tenant environment)
Because of the fingerprint, you can see that the model on Tenant A and Tenant B has the same content.
ZIP files are encrypted in order to avoid any data corruption. That means the exported file can't be opened.