Software Configuration Management

Software Configuration management is a set of activities carried out for

identfying, organising and controlling changes throughout the lifecycle of computer

software.

During the development of software change must be managed and controlled in

order to improve quality and reduce error. Hence Software Configuration

Management is a quality assurance activity that is applied throughout the software

process.

Need for SCM

The software configuration management is concerned with managing the changes in

the evolving

software. If the changes are not controlled at all then this stream of uncontrolled

change can

cause the well-running software project into chaos. Hence it is essential to perform

following

activities -

· Identify these changes

· Control the changes

· Ensure that the changes are properly implemented and

· Report these changes to others.

The software configuration management may be seen as part of quality

management process.

Baseline

• The IEEE (IEEE Std. No. 610.12-1990) defines a baseline as:

A specification or product that has been formally reviewed and agreed upon, that

thereafter

serves as the basis for further development, and that can be changed only through

formal changecontrol procedures.

• A baseline is a milestone in the development of software that is marked by the

delivery of oneor more software configuration items and the approval of them is

obtained through formaltechnical review

• Further changes to the program architecture (which is actually documented in the

design

model) can be made only after each has been evaluated and approved.

Configuration

Management Planning

Configuration planning defines the standards and procedures that should be used for

configuration management. Initially configuration management standards must be

set. Thesestandards must be adapted to fit the requirements and to identify

constraints. The configurationmanagement plan consists of -

· Definition of managed configuration items and schemes used for identifying

the entities.

· Find out the targets that are responsible for configuration management

procedures.

· Define configuration management policies which can be used for control and

version

management.

· Specify the name of the tool used for configuration management along with its

use.

· Describe configuration management database structure so that stored

information can bemaintained.

Software Configuration Item Identification

A Software Configuration Item (SCI) is information that is created as part of the

software

engineering process.

Examples of Software Configuration Items are

• COMPUTER PROGRAMS

· Source programs

· Executable programs

• DOCUMENTS DESCRIBING THE PROGRAMS

· Technical manual

· User’s manual

• DATA

· Program components or functions

· External data

· File structure

For each type of item, there may be a large number of different individual items

produced. Forinstance there may be many documents for a software specification

such as project plan, qualityplan, test plan, design documents, programs, test

reports, review reports. These SCI or items willbe produced during the project,

stored, retrieved, changed, stored again, and so on.Each configuration item must

have a unique name, and a description or specification whichdistinguishes it from

other items of the same type.