Converting Idea to Project generrate too many entries in audit trail

Products

• Clarity PPM On Premise
• Clarity PPM SaaS

Issue/Introduction

When converting an Idea instance to a Project, three Audit entries are getting captured for an attribute in audit trail.
There should be at most one audit line entry from the Idea to Project template and another entry from Project template value to the value being set by a Process being used.

STEPS TO REPRODUCE: 

1. Create a static lookup with say 10 values. The IDs are in numerical order eg: 1 - 10. Examples of values are 'Detailed Business Case', 'Transition  
   Phase' and 'High Level Business Case'.
2. Create a lookup attribute called 'Phase' on Project using lookup create in step 1
3. Create a lookup attribute called 'Phase' on Idea object using lookup create in step 1
4. Put the attribute 'Phase' in both 'Layout Create' and 'Layout Edit' in Views section of Project and Idea objects.
5. Create a boolean attribute on Project object called "Project Business Case" and put the attribute in both 'Layout Create' and 'Layout Edit' in Views 
   section of Project
6. Create an Idea instance and populate the 'Phase' attribute with a value eg: 'Transition Phase' and save it. 
7. Create a Project Template and populate the 'Phase' attribute with a value eg: "High Level Business Case". also check the boolean attribute 
   "Project Business case"
8. Create a Project based process with Auto-Start "Start Option" and "Start Event" set as 'Create' and Start Condition is when boolean attribute   
   "Project Business Case" is checked (Project Project Business Case = 1).
9. In the Start step of the process create a System Action that sets the lookup attribute 'Phase' to the value 'Detailed Business Case'          
10. In the Project object add the lookup attribute 'Phase' as an Audited Attribute.
11. Open the Idea instance created in step 6 and click on 'Convert' button. In the 'Investment Type' page select 'Project from Template' then select 
     the Project template created in step 7 and save to create a Project.
12. Process created in step 8 would have kicked off to set new value for the lookup attribute 'Phase' in newly created project. Now check the 'Audit   
      Trail' tab of the project    

 

Expected Results: 

Phase attribute value changes from 'Transition Phase' to 'High Level Business Case' then to 'High Level Business Case' to 'Detailed Business Case'

 

Actual Results: 

Phase attribute value changes from 'Transition Phase' to 'High Level Business Case' then to 'High Level Business Case' to 'Transition Phase' then from 'Transition Phase' to 'Detailed Business Case'

 

Environment

Release : 15.8.1, 15.9.1

Component : CA PPM STUDIO

Resolution

This behaviour is considered "Working as designed" due to following reasons.

Converting "Idea to Project using project template", there are three sources to initialize/update value for an attribute.

1. Value that user can override before saving it to a project.
2. Value coming from Project Template that is being selected.
3. Value coming from Idea instance that is being converted.

First preference goes for user overridden value, second preference is for value (if present) that idea instance has, third preference is for value that project template has.

In the steps outlined above, first there is an unsaved instance with Source #1, then copies values from Template, then copies values from Idea Instance.

Having multiple entries in audit records is expected as it helps user to understand from what sources the attribute's value is getting initialized or getting updated.