The Chicken and the Egg

Within the FuGE-OM, the AccessRight association (visible within the AuditMain class diagram) links the SecurityAccess entity to the OntologyTerm entity with a 0...1 relationship. You will find within the XmlDbRoundtripTest that any reference to the "accessRight" association end is removed before comparing the original XML file and the XML file that was generated from the database information. This is because of a basic chicken-and-the-egg problem between AuditCollection and OntologyCollection.

This attribute of SecurityAccess links to an item in the OntologyCollection. However, the AuditCollection *must* be loaded in the database before we can proceed to parsing the OntologyCollection, as the OntologyCollection may have Audit Trails that are referenced by the AuditCollection. However, if the ontology term that is referenced by the accessRight association is not yet in the database, that association simply cannot be set within the SecurityAccess class.

In normal use, such ontology terms would already be present in the database, however for a unit test round trip which is generating a new random XML file for each unit test, the ontology term is NOT yet in the database. Hence the chicken-and-the-egg situation. Therefore, this association is purposely removed from the XML file prior to running the comparison of the before and after XML files, so that a known bug won't shield an unknown one.

Any suggestions on resolving this situation would be most appreciated.