Changes are inevitable in any software development project. Software configuration management provides a discipline for identifying items to be managed, controlling changes, maintaining integrity and traceability of the components that are required to develop the final software product throughout its life cycle. This can prove to be a task in itself and at times present a variety of decisions that not only impact software developers, but management as well. Configuration management is an integral part of the software development process and supports the management and the control of the project at any point in time.

The main objective of software configuration management is to manage the change process and track changes to ensure that the configuration of the software product is accurately known at any given time.

Keeping track of your progress and history for applications you develop can be a daunting task, even for a small project. This is where this book can prove to be an invaluable resource for anyone who is new or has some experience with Microsoft Visual SourceSafe. Software configuration management can help you or your team and all projects must implement a configuration management process which best suits their needs.