The Compare and Synchronize process

It's important to understand the underlying principles of the Compare and Synchronize process.

You can only use Compare and Synchronize if the chosen source and target models are structurally compatible with one another. Two models are structurally compatible when the latest revision of the target model exists in the structural information history of the source model.

Source and target models are structurally compatible if:

• The target model was created if you copied or imported the source model.
• The target model was created from a revision tag in the source model.

This creates a link between the models, which ensures that they are structurally compatible.

There is no mechanism to synchronize changes between models whose structural information has changed independently. This rule applies even if the models were originally compatible, but structural changes were subsequently made to the target model.

To ensure that your models remain structurally compatible for synchronization, we strongly recommend:

• Only make structural changes to source models.
  Warning: If structural changes are made to a target model, it will become incompatible with its source models.
• Enable deployed mode to prevent structural changes to target models.

To use Compare and Synchronize, you must be a Workspace Administrator in both the source and target models.

If you're a Single Sign-on (SSO) user, you can only synchronize models in or across workspaces that are assigned to the same SSO server. If you're also an Exception User, make sure you have Exception User status in every SSO-enabled workspace that contains models you want to synchronize.

Compare and Synchronize doesn't allow you to pick and choose the changes you want to move from the source model to the target model. All structural changes, which includes those saved by the chosen source revision tag, are moved from the source model to the target model.

The Compare and Synchronize process is one-way. Structural changes made in the source model are moved to the target model, but any changes made in the target model are not written back to the source model.

You can only use Compare and Synchronize to move changes to one target model at a time.

To synchronize two structurally compatible models, the source must contain a later revision tag than the target. Otherwise, there are no structural changes to move. If the source model is at an earlier revision than the target, you'll see the No Compatible Models With Revision Tags Found message when you attempt to synchronize.

Make at least one structural change in the source model, add a revision tag, then try again.

To see all the changes you're about to sync, you can download a comparison report on the structural differences between the target and source model. This tab-delimited (.txt) file provides more comprehensive information than the high-level summary available in the Compare & Synchronize dialogs. For example:

• If the summary shows one new version, the report details the version name and all of its properties.
• If the summary shows one modified list, the report tells you the list name and which items and properties were added, moved, deleted or changed.

Every addition and change to the source model's structural information is included in the report. To reduce the file size, list items are not shown individually.

You can also download a comparison report  on the structural differences between two revision tags in the same model.