Data Types

There are two new Aras Innovator Data Types that were introduced in 11.0 SP15 that enable the tracking of changes to items on a Source system. These Data Types are very important in order to monitor and maintain synchronization between the Source and Destination systems.

The Global Version is a unique value across the entire database that should be attached to every ItemType that is intended to be synchronized. ItemTypes that will be synched should have the optional global_version property attached that will be incremented any time the item is updated. The value of a global_version property is handled by the system and cannot be modified by an administrator. In order to ensure that the value is unique, the Data Type supports values between 0 and 2⁶⁴-1.

The Global Version is a unique Data Type that is only used for the global_version property. In order to store and compare the current global_version value with a previously stored version, the Unsigned BigInt Data Type is introduced in order to be able to track the Global Version of an item. Since the value of a global_version property can range from 0 to 2⁶⁴-1, an Integer will not support values large enough to store and compare a global_version value, requiring the support for an Unsigned BigInt.