Example: The Life Cycle of a Package

Learn about the life cycle of a package.

The following section demonstrates the various steps necessary to create a package, including importing and exporting the package and generating associated documentation.

Note: update recommends that you develop and test your packages outside your production environment! It also makes sense to create a second (test) database that is used to import and test your package.

The life cycle of a package goes through the following stages:

  1. Defining the configuration items in Aurea.CRM.
  2. Defining the package, including all processes and items, see Step 1: Defining the Package.
  3. Exporting the package for use in another database, see Step 2: Exporting the Package.
  4. Importing the exported .zip file in the target database, see Step 3: Importing the Package.
  5. Generating documentation, see Step 5: Generating Documentation.
  6. Maintenance of the package, including changes to the package or items included in the package, see Step 4: Updating the Package

For information on configuring items in Aurea.CRM, refer to the corresponding manuals.

In general, defining your package is a less linear process than described here. Configuring Aurea.CRM generally involves testing the various configuration items, and you often add further configuration items to the database after creating the initial package. Configuring Aurea.CRM and defining the package therefore often take place concurrently. Use the synchronize function to add newly defined configuration items to your package and to remove items that have subsequently been deleted from the database.

However, for the purpose of this example, we shall treat configuring the application and defining the package as separate steps.