Workflow

There are two interwoven workflows in configuration and change management: one from the perspective of the CM product structure, shown in Figure 13-6, and a second one from the perspective of the life of a change request.

Figure 13-6. The configuration and change management workflow

Plan Project Configuration and Change Control

The configuration management plan describes all CM- related activities that need to be resourced and performed during the course of a project. It describes the procedures and policies applied to identify, safeguard, and report on all artifacts that are generated during the project lifecycle. Project naming conventions are important because they facilitate communication and enable easy identification of configuration items for updating or reuse. Project artifacts are the tangible assets that need to be safeguarded. Safeguarding is achieved through the enforcement of archiving, baselining, and access control privileges.

The CM plan also describes the project change control process. The purpose of a change control process is to ensure that all changes planned or made to a project artifact are done by informing the appropriate stakeholders. Managers and co-workers need to know about the exact nature of the change and understand the impact on cost and schedule.

Create a Project CM Environment

The CM environment should facilitate product development. All project members should be able to get, and work on, the correct development artifacts as they need them.

The purpose of this activity is to create a work environment where all developmental artifacts are available and where the product can be developed, integrated, and archived for subsequent maintenance and reuse. The CM environment provides developers and integrators private and shared workspaces where they can build and integrate software.

Change and Deliver Configuration Items

This workflow detail refers to the way any role can create a workspace. Within a workspace a role can access project artifacts, make changes to those artifacts, and deliver the changes for inclusion in the overall product. Delivery of changes is made into an integration workspace that can include submissions from multiple roles. The idea is to integrate the individual contributions and make those visible to developers for the next round of development.

From the integration workspace, the Integrator builds the product, creates baselines, and then makes the baselines available to the rest of the development team.

Manage Baselines and Releases

A baseline is a description of all the versions of artifacts that make up the product at any given time. Typically, baselines are created at ends of iterations and at project and delivery milestones. A product should be baselined each time it is released to a customer. When a customer has a problem with a given release, the development or maintenance team can revert to a release baseline to re-create and fix the particular defect.

Monitor and Report Configuration Status

The CM environment provides the context for all software development work. All artifacts need to be put under configuration control, and the CM manager is responsible for creating the workspaces where developers and integrators perform their work.

As the custodian of the project repositories, the CM manager has to make sure that they are safe and have all the necessary artifacts. The CM manager is also responsible for reporting on the state of the configuration. Configuration reporting can provide good input to project management for tracking overall project progress and trends. For example, reporting on defects and their closure rates not only can help determine where the problems lie, but also can provide information that can be factored into determining the impact on project cost and schedules.

Manage Change Requests

The purpose of a standard, documented change control process is to ensure that changes in a project are made in a consistent manner and the appropriate stakeholders are informed of the state of the product, changes to it, and impact of these changes on the cost and schedule.