RuleDocs can be stored either directly on your file system or placed in document libraries on an ILOG Rule Team Server for SharePoint site. In either case, before you begin working with a RuleDoc, you must ensure that any changes developers may make to the rule artifacts and rule projects that make up your RuleDocs are carried over into your file, while at the same time ensuring that developers have access to any updates you or your colleagues may make locally or from within Rule Team Server. The process through which this is achieved is known as synchronization.

The synchronization mechanism has two main phases:

The synchronization process takes this developer-centric view because the specific actions that need to be carried out are always performed in Rule Studio. It is the developer who either pushes changes out from Rule Studio to Rule Team Server or your local file system, or pulls them in from Rule Team Server or your local file system to Rule Studio.

Your part in the process is to remember always to check in any documents you have worked on once you have finished, if you are working in Rule Team Server, or to communicate regularly with your colleagues to ensure you are working with the latest versions of the files.

For further details of how the synchronization mechanism operates, consult the documentation for ILOG Rule Studio for .NET.