base rule

A base rule is the fallback rule selected by rule resolution when no other circumstance version's criteria is met. Base rules are sometimes referred to as "unqualified" in that they have no circumstance qualification.

A base rule must exist for every circumstance or qualified rule. To verify if an existing rule is either a base rule or a circumstanced version, open it in the Designer Studio and inspect the form header. The Circumstanced link will appear; click it to see the circumstance values or an indication that the rule is a base version. If the existing rule is neither a base nor a circumstanced version, the link will not be visible.

To see all available circumstances for a given base rule, navigate to the rule in the Application Explorer. Use the expand icon next to the name of the base rule to display each of the circumstanced instances and their values.

By default, you create a base rule when using the Create Form. To create circumstances for a base rule, open the base rule in the Designer Studio and use the Save As > Specialize by circumstance action.

Restrictions

• Rules with a Start, End or circumstance value are known as qualified rules, as they are valid only when certain qualifications are met. You cannot delete a base, unqualified rule when a qualified rule with the same key exists; the unqualified version provides a fallback.
• For rules with an Apply to key part, the base rule can have an Apply to class that is a parent or ancestor class of the Apply to class of the circumstance rule.
• You cannot check out a rule that is a base rule when you or another developer has a related circumstance or qualified rule checked out.
• You cannot check out the base rule of a time-qualified rule at a time between the start and end date and time.
• If a time-qualified stream rule contains JSP tags (rather than directives), the base rule must also contain JSP tags rather than directives. Conversely, if the time-qualified rule contains directives, the base rule must contain directives.
• In releases before V5.2, circumstance-qualified rules with a RuleSet version number lower than the RuleSet version of a base rule were ignored (never selected) during rule resolution. Starting with V5.2, this is not the default rule resolution behavior: you can copy a base rule to a higher version without the need to also copy each of the (possibly many) qualified rules associated with the base rule into that higher version. If desired, you can revert to pre-5.2 behavior by selecting the Base Rule checkbox on the form produced by the Availability label on the rule toolbar.

	circumstance, time-qualified rule
	Circumstances — Concepts and terms Completing the Specialization Form Completing the Create Form

Definitions