Jan 25, 2018 software configuration management scm is a set of processes, policies, and tools that organize the development process. Multiple choices 1 scm is the art of identifying, organizing and controlling modifications to the software being built by programming team. I get a number of questions about the differences between a configuration management system and a change management system. The cm process is widely used by military engineering organizations to manage changes throughout the system lifecycle of complex systems, such. The software configuration management scm process is. Definition of software configuration management pcmag. Software configuration management is a process independent of. Configuration drift is caused by inconsistent configuration items cis across computers or devices. Software change and configuration management provide a framework for. Wthout it, the effectiveness of the rest of your processes will be in. The goal of having an scm process is to successfully deliver a software product to a customer or market in concordance with your business plan.
Most people in the software development industry refer to the source code management alone as configuration management. To summarize, the entire configuration management process can be viewed as. In software engineering, software configuration management scm is the task of tracking and controlling changes in the software. Configuration management practices include revision control and. Understand how to define scm and discuss how to accomplish it. In software engineering, software configuration management scm or sw cm is the task of tracking and controlling changes in the software, part of the larger crossdisciplinary field of. Where we do not know which one is the right version and which document is compatible with the other. Software configuration management activities promotion management, release management, change management outline of a software configuration. Software configuration management an overview sciencedirect.
Configuration management is an increasingly important foundation for a successful tech platform. This includes technical aspects of the project, all level of communications, organization, and the control of modifications changes to the project plan by the programmers during the development phase. What is software configuration management software testing. This seemingly simple question is the one we cm professionals are often asked, and at times we stumble to offer the answer that really drives home the true purpose of what we do as configuration.
Configuration management is a set of interrelated processes, management techniques, and supporting tools that assure. Csci an aggregation of software that satisfies an end use function and is designated for separate configuration management by the acquirer. Mar 28, 2017 simply put, for software development, a baseline is a static i. Pdmplm and erp systems can provide the tools to support configuration management. So, advanced planning is very important to make this work. Software development is a kind of all new stream in world business and theres very little experience in building software products. A system can be defined as the combination of interacting elements. Software configuration management synonyms, software configuration management pronunciation, software configuration management translation, english dictionary definition of software configuration management. What is the purpose of configuration management cm. Configuration management cm is a systems engineering process for establishing and maintaining consistency of a products performance, functional, and physical attributes with its requirements, design, and operational information throughout its life.
The third major aspect of a configuration management system is automation software, which is responsible for making sure that the target systems and software are maintained in the desired state. The purpose of the baseline is to have a static reference point for changes that occur once the baseline is crea. Oct 22, 2017 in software engineering, software configuration management scm or sw cm is the task of tracking and controlling changes in the software, part of the larger crossdisciplinary field of. Official definition of csci computer software configuration. Configuration management database for recording configuration information. Software configuration management scm is a software engineering discipline consisting of standard processes and techniques often used by. Standard for software configuration management plans, was used to guide.
Software configuration management scm is a set of processes, policies, and tools that organize the development process. Auditing is included in some definitions of configuration management. Apr 11, 2020 configuration management database for recording configuration information. Object oriented testing in software testing introduction to pervasive computing analysis modelling in software engineering levels of. And not only is it easy to change, but it is unconstrained by the physical laws that serve as the guardrails of what is possible with hardware systems. Due to inadequate configuration management procedures, the latest hardware and software revisions were uploaded and installed into a system with an outdated configuration, rendering the test a. It is based on the information technology infrastructure technology library itil and adapted to address vuits specific requirements. Software engineering system configuration management.
Software configuration management definition of software. A set of management disciplines within a software engineering process to develop a baseline software configuration management encompasses the disciplines and techniques of initiating, evaluating and controlling change to software. Software configuration management scm is a software engineering discipline consisting of standard processes and techniques often used by organizations to manage the changes introduced to its software products. Software configuration management software configuration management scm is the process of identifying and defining the scis in the system and coordinating the changes made to these items a formal definition. Software configuration management scm is the discipline for systematically controlling the changes that take place during development. Another aspect of a configuration management system is the description of the desired state for the systems. This question arises because most project managers have heard about a change management system, and change control, but most of them havent seen, heard or used a configuration management system.
Although version control, which maintains a database of revisions, is part of the system, a fullblown software configuration management. Any change management software should have the following 3 key features. Software configuration an overview sciencedirect topics. What configuration management is and where it originated from. A configuration management process and its supporting repository, cmdb or cms, face the challenge of overlapping and contradicting data from sources across the enterprise. Activities and roles in software configuration management some terminology configuration item, baseline, scm directory, version, revision release.
Software and hardware configuration management ivv 10 version. During the project planning stage and perhaps as part of your own test plan make sure that configuration management procedures and tools are selected. A configuration management plan should address the responsibilities, procedures, activities, and oversight necessary to provide configuration identification, change control, status accounting and configuration. The software updates configuration items are sent to child sites by using database replication. Administrators, technicians, and software developers can use. Software configuration management scm is a set of processes, policies, and tools that. A baseline is a configuration of a hardware, software. Configuration management determines clearly about the items that make up the software or system. Simply put, for software development, a baseline is a static i. The purpose of the baseline is to have a static reference. It is abbreviated as the scm process in software engineering. Sep 12, 2019 configuration management is an increasingly important foundation for a successful tech platform. Find out inside pcmag s comprehensive tech and computerrelated encyclopedia.
Software configuration management in software engineering. Software configuration management scm is the the overall management of a software design project as it evolves into a software product or system. This document provides a practical guide for integrating software configuration management disciplines into the management of software engineering projects. Configuration management, however, can have many connotations, depending on whos discussing it. Software is bounded only by the limits of the human imagination. Administrators, technicians, and software developers can use configuration management tools to verify the effect a change to one configuration item has on. A fivestep model for configuration management techrepublic. Cm is the application of sound program practices to establish and maintain consistency of a products or systems attributes with its requirements and evolving technical baseline over its life. Configuration management is a topic that is very complex. Softwareconfigurationmanagement dictionary definition. Dec 19, 2016 configuration management process 4 introduction this document describes the configuration management process and configuration management database cmdb data dictionary that is implemented in cherwell. Nov 12, 2007 there are two meanings for the project management process of configuration management. In software engineering, software configuration management scm or sw cm is the task of tracking and controlling changes in the software, part of the larger crossdisciplinary field of configuration management.
Good leaders in the tech space will want to know what it takes to implement it. Generally, a configuration is the arrangement or the process of making the arrangement of the parts that make up a whole. Software configuration management is a process to systematically manage, organize, and control the changes in the documents, codes, and other entities during the software development life cycle. In this context, configuration management attempts to define which components of a system are available and operating up to standard. Since traditional configuration management literature does not commonly use the term variation, we use it here to describe an items evolution in a general way, regardless of whether such an evolution requires releasing a formal revision or a new inventory part number. This video is a short overview of the what is configuration. Configuration consists of both hardware and software components. This includes any end products that will be delivered to the customer, as well as all management products, such as the project management plan and performance management baseline.
An introduction to configuration management digitalocean. Configuration management helps organizations to systematically manage, organize, and control. The goal of scm is to improve the speed of and quality by catching errors early and enabling quick fixes when they occur. Software configuration management is the process of identifying and defining the software configuration items in a system, controlling the release and change of these items throughout the system lifecycle, recording and reporting the. Practical lessons, over the years, had led to the definition, and establishment, of procedures and tools. Uncontrolled and undirected, imagination can quickly give rise to nightmare. Configuration management manages configurable items. This enables you to effectively build a multistage ecosystem, with production, development, and testing servers. The purpose of this system level procedure slp is to define configuration management cm, its constituent functions, processes, and procedures, and. In itil terminology, configuration management refers to the process of defining configuration items ci within a system and recording and reporting on the status of the cis and any requests for change, then.
Project configuration management is managing the configuration of all of the projects key products and assets. Software configuration management scm a practical guide. Configuration management is one of the few processes that overarch all other process and service lifecycle phases in itil v3. Cm is the application of sound program practices to establish and maintain consistency of a products. Scm practices include revision control and the establishment of baselines. Configuration management determines clearly about the items that make up the software. What is configuration management in project management. Configuration management makes it trivial to replicate environments with the exact same software and configurations. The program manager pm is responsible configuration management cm on their project or program. If something goes wrong, scm can determine what was changed and who changed it. When two or more tasks are happening at the same time, it is known as concurrent operation. Software configuration management scm is a software engineering discipline consisting of standard processes and techniques often used by organizations to manage the changes introduced to its software.
Sometimes, people specifically point to hardware arrangement as hardware configuration and to software components as software configuration. Introduction to software updates configuration manager. A project is well defined task, which is a collection of several operations done in order to achieve a goal for example, software. Configuration management is a critical discipline in delivering products that meet customer requirements and that are built according to approved design documentation. Software configuration management scm is a supportingsoftware life.
Software configuration management article about software. When synchronization has finished successfully, wsus synchronization manager creates status message 6702. What does software configuration management actually mean. Configuration drift occurs naturally in data center environments when changes to software and hardware are made ad hoc and are not recorded or tracked in a comprehensive and systematic fashion. Configuration is the manner in which components are arranged to make up the computer system. In software engineering, software configuration management is the task of tracking and. Special configuration management software is available, such as bmc software s atrium and hewlett packard enterprises universal configuration management database. Some see it as a product of configuration management, but its actually the gateway from production to configuration management, provided by quality assurance. Defining a software configuration management process to. The job pattern of an it company engaged in software development can be seen split in two parts. Configuration management cm is a governance and systems engineering process for ensuring consistency among physical and logical assets in an operational environment. Configuration management encompasses the technical and administrative activities concerned with the creation, maintenance, controlled change.
This may mean little to a programmer, but the configuration management cm teams decisions needs to take into account both the customer and the business case. Apr 26, 2017 a lot of options exist for configuration management and the different tools have different approaches to solving the same problem. Although version control, which maintains a database of revisions, is part of the system, a fullblown software configuration management system scm system or cm system automatically documents. This guide defines and explains what software configuration management is, provides guidelines on how to do it, and defines in detail what a software configuration management. What is the meaning of baseline in software configuration. System configuration mainly refers to the specification of a given computer system, from its hardware components to the software and various processes that are run within that system. It can be used for the process of identifying, tracking, and managing of all the physical assets of a project. Scm is the process of identifying and defining the items in the system, controlling the changes of these items throughout their life cycle, recording and reporting the status of items and change requests, and verifying the completeness and correctness of items. Cscis are selected based on tradeoffs among software function, size, host or target computers, developer, support concept, plans for reuse, criticality, interface considerations, need to be separately. Configuration management process 4 introduction this document describes the configuration management process and configuration management database cmdb data dictionary. Most software products are tailor made to fit clients requirements. Configuration management and engineering change control. The configuration management process seeks to identify and track individual configuration items cis, documenting functional capabilities, and interdependencies. Software configuration management is a process independent of the development process largely because most development models cannot accommodate change at any time during development.
The software updates metadata is stored in the site database as a configuration item. It refers to what types and models of devices are installed and what specific software. Scm helps in identifying individual elements and configurations, tracking changes, and version selection, control, and baselining. The scm process further defines the need to trace changes, and the. Configuration management definition of configuration. This may mean little to a programmer, but the configuration management. What is configuration management in software testing. What is configuration management and how does it work. Jul 01, 2014 software configuration management scm is a software engineering discipline consisting of standard processes and techniques often used by organizations to manage the changes introduced to its software products. Software configuration management is the process of identifying and defining the software configuration. The item approval, which may be a written quality record or verbal, is a product of quality assurance. Its all about ensuring that we do not get into the pile of documents.
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