Version Control

Definition

Version Control

the configuration management task of managing multiple versions of work products that may or may not also be configuration items

Classification

As illustrated in the preceding figure, Version Control is part of the following inheritance hierarchy:

• Type: Abstract
• Superclass: Configuration Management Task
• Subclasses:
  • None

Responsibilities

The typical responsibilities of Version Control are to:

• Ensure that the correct versions of the work products are used.
• Ensure that all versions of all work products are stored and retrievable.

Preconditions

Version control typically can begin when the following preconditions hold:

• The configuration management team is staffed.
• The configuration management team is adequately trained in version control.
• Multiple versions of a work product exist.

Completion Criteria

Version control is typically complete when the following postconditions hold:

• All work products are retired.

Steps

Version control typically involves the following teams and roles performing the following steps in an iterative, incremental, and parallel manner:

• TBD

Techniques

Version control typically can be performed using the following techniques:

• A configuration management tool that supports version control.

Work Products

Version control typically results in the production of the following work products:

• An identified version of a work product.

Guidelines

• Version control is at a finer granularity than configuration control in that elements of a configuration item may be under version control, although they are not under configuration control.
• Just because the versions of a work product are controlled dues not mean that the work product is a configuration item that is also under configuration control.
• All important work products should be version controlled.
• Version control is a prerequisite of configuration control.
• Different tools are often used to support version control of different kinds of work products (e.g., source code control, document control, requirements control).
• Work product producers can often use automated tools to directly place versions of their work products under version control. This is unlike configuration control, which is performed by the configuration management team.