NIEM Editor - Release 1.0 - 2011-03-31 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The NIEM Editor allows users to create new domains, edit domain content, and create new domain updates for submission to the NIEM publication area. Existing NIEM 2.1 content is included in the tool for reference and use, but in uneditable as it is a previously released version. Some disabled menu items are present in the NIEM Editor to represent potential future functionality. Restrictions ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The downloadable version of the tool is restricted to only allow changes to new domains. To receive a version of the tool that allows the creation of domain updates for previously existing domains, users will need to receive approval from their respective domain's steward. This is to prevent users from accidentally publishing updates involving the wrong domain. The NTAC and NBAC will facilitate the management of the domain stewards and the users. If you would like to use NIEM Editor to edit a specific domain, please contact the domain steward for that domain, or the NTAC/NBAC. Creating a New Domain Update ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To begin editing a new domain update for a new domain, open the "File" menu and select "New Project", "Domain with Domain Update". This will open a form to allow you to enter information to create the new domain, a new namespace for the domain, and a domain update. Enter your publication area key to allow publishing to a publication area. To create a new domain update for an existing or previously created domain, open the "File" menu and select "New Project", "Domain Update". This will allow you to choose existing domain to use for the creation of a domain update. If no existing domains are listed in the dropdown field, then the version of the tool is not enabled to edit any existing domains (see "Restrictions", above). You can still start by creating a new "Domain with Domain Update" instead. Creating New Content ------------------------------------------------------------------------ After creating a domain update, new content can be created for that domain, and any previously existing content will now be editable. From the "Model" menu, select "New", and the kind of content you would like to create. This will open a form for creating the new content. Click "Save" when finished entering the content and the component will be created and will be usable and searchable throughout the tool. Checking Content ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To run conformance, impact, and quality checks on a domain update, select the desired check from the "Analysis" menu. Verify that it is going to run on the correct domain update from the information displayed, then click the "Analyze" button. This action may be slow for large content sets. Exporting Schemas ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To export schema content, open the "File" menu and select "Export", then select the type of export that you would like to generate. An exported domain update will consist of only the new schemas that have been created, the catalog file, and change log file. Exporting a "namespace schema subset" will generate a full namespace subset (including its dependencies) for a namespace. This can be useful for testing a domain update that is in progress. Exporting the entire "model schema set" tries to generate schema content for everything. Importing ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To import a previously exported domain update, in the "File" menu select "Import" then select "Domain Update". To import a UML document into a domain update, in the "File" menu select "Import" then select "UML". This will allow loading of previously created UML content to be used in creation of the domain update. Uploading to and downloading from the NIEM publication area ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To view the current contents of the publication area, open the "Publish" menu and select "Explore NIEM Publication Area". This will display a list of the current contents of the publication area, including the items awaiting processing. Uploaded domain updates go into a processing area for checking before they are released as "published" in the publication area. Domain updates that have been checked and have the "published" status can be downloaded and used for reference in other content. To upload a domain update to the publication area, open the "Publish" menu and select "Publish to NIEM Publication Area". It is not necessary to export the domain update before uploading to the publication area. The tool will generate the domain update before uploading. Further documentation ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Please see the help documentation located in the installation directory: "NIEM Editor.chm". Download and Installation notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The release is available at: http://130.207.211.162/niem/NIEM%20Editor.zip 1) You will need at least 500MB of space. 2) Delete any previous model editor installations. 3) Extract zip into "C:\Program Files\NIEM Editor" and run niemtool.exe to execute the Domain Update Model Editor. 4) When starting the NIEM editor for the first time, you may be prompted to allow ports to be accessed for internal communication; click unblock when asked. 5) Create a new Domain Update from the File menu to start editing. Known issues ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Model Editor is currently limited to use by a single user. Collaboration on a domain update is currently not supported. Initial creation of a domain update for a large domain is slow because it is creating an editable copy of everything in the domain. Initial startup time is slow due to initialization and loading the content. Some features that require a significant amount of processing on the model can be slow. There is an issue that Microsoft Windows cannot have full path names that are longer than 256 characters. There are some embedded paths in the tool that are long enough to cause issues if the package is unzipped into a directory with too long of a path. The error message from Windows or the unzipping application is usually misleading about the problem. If you get an error unzipping please extract into "C:\Program Files\NIEM Editor".