TECHNICAL BRIEF

PVCS® Choices for Software

Configuration Management
Overview
Enterprises seeking to leverage change for competitive advantage continually
look for ways to improve their software configuration management (SCM) tools
and practices. SCM enables faster implementation of change, with fewer errors
and less risk. Such improvement requires that people, processes, and products
be advanced along a growth path of SCM capabilities.
To successfully move forward, all three – people, processes, and products –
must maintain compatibility with one another within an overall system for
enterprise change management of digital assets. People – both management and
developers – must buy into the development processes, and the SCM products
must underpin those processes. If not, failure may result. For example,
implementing a process-rich SCM product in a process-challenged organization
is prone to fail.
The PVCS product family provides a growth path from entry-level SCM to
comprehensive process-centric change management.

PVCS Growth Path for SCM

MERANT PVCS is the industry standard enterprise change manager. PVCS
provides a comprehensive change management platform that lets customers
protect their digital assets (software, applications, and content), manage change
processes, and communicate throughout their teams – facilitating change across
the enterprise.
MERANT’s offering for SCM is unique because MERANT understands that a
single SCM tool cannot meet the diverse people and process needs of every
enterprise. For example, PVCS Professional™ provides excellent version
management, issue management, and build management. PVCS Dimensions™
includes all those capabilities, plus it adds process/workflow management,
baseline management, and release management. The correct product choice for a
specific team/enterprise depends on the specific people and process situation.

PVCS Professional
PVCS Professional provides versioning, issue management and configuration
build capability — all in a single package. Together, these capabilities enable
basic process control of software development to ensure the protection and
management of software assets during change.
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PVCS Professional can be quickly implemented for small to mid-size teams.

These teams then are able to coordinate development and communicate changes
and status at every step, as they build reliable systems with reduced time to
market. PVCS Professional combines the capabilities of PVCS Version
Manager™, PVCS Tracker™ and PVCS Configuration Builder™ within an
integrated suite.

PVCS Dimensions
PVCS Dimensions provides, in a single platform, comprehensive process
control, versioning, baseline management, issue management, release
management, build management, and workflow management. For teams of all
sizes, from small and nimble to the entire globally distributed enterprise and for
simple or complex projects, it can be rapidly implemented, ensuring protection
and management of digital assets. These teams are coordinated and
communicating at every step, as they rapidly build reliable systems.
With process control that can be easily customized to meet specific needs,
PVCS Dimensions can simplify your change management across multiple-sites
in an enterprise. PVCS Dimensions manages not only digital assets but team and
project workflow as well.

High-level Comparison of PVCS SCM Capabilities

Both PVCS Professional and PVCS Dimensions address version management,
build management, and issue management.
Process and workflow management, baseline management and release
management are addressed in a basic way with PVCS Professional by using
links, interfaces and data sharing between the components of the suite.
PVCS Dimensions is more advanced in its capabilities for build, release and
process management. It relies on a single metadatabase repository and tightly
integrates all management functions under a single, dynamic system. PVCS
Dimensions manages all areas of SCM and the items, components, roles and
processes involved, including enforcement of workflow steps, checkpoints and
approvals.
In a nutshell, PVCS Professional and PVCS Dimensions differ in their level of
enablement for the most advanced SCM functions. Depending on the specifics
of development needs and team structures, an enterprise may choose one over
the other, begin with one and migrate to the other, or selectively use both within
an overall enterprise SCM system.
The following diagram shows the high-level differences between PVCS
Professional and PVCS Dimensions.

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The enterprise can choose which PVCS product offers the appropriate features and scale for its
teams and processes. SCM capability can be increased by advancing people, processes and products
forward to the next level of PVCS functionality.

Comparison of Decision Points for PVCS Choices

As the table below shows, candidates for PVCS Professional have different
people expectations and processes than do prospects for PVCS Dimensions.
Therefore, it is important to understand the existing people expectations and
processes before determining whether Professional or Dimensions is the most
appropriate product for a given team or enterprise.

Table I. Expectations: People and Processes

People PVCS Professional
• Management May allow individual
contributors latitude to
define/follow their own
development processes, or
may prescribe loosely
defined processes.
• Individual contributors May be concerned that
processes would get in their
way.
Processes PVCS Professional
• Software development lifecycle Software development
lifecycle may not be
documented.
PVCS Dimensions
Recognize the need for defined
development processes
Understand that defined
processes increase productivity
and software quality.
PVCS Dimensions
Software development
lifecycle is defined and
followed.

• Promotion model May not have defined Have defined procedures for
procedures for promoting promoting code from
code from development to development to test to

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test to production.
• Issue management process May have a defined and
automated process, and
issues may be linked to
code.
• Build processes May not be able to rebuild
old versions.
Table II. Features: PVCS Professional and PVCS Dimensions
Feature Product
Version Management PVCS Professional
• Access control Can control who perform
which selected tasks on what
items.
• Integration with Build Management (See PVCS Configuration
Build Management below) Builder accesses PVCS
Version Manager archives.
• Reporting Capabilities Text and graphical HTML
reports. Data allows export
for use by external tools.
• Integration with Issue (change request) Integrated with PVCS
Management (See Issue Management Tracker via TrackerLink;
below) enables easy code module
association with change
records.
• Cross-platform Support PC to UNIX requires NFS
mounting.
• Branch and merge worksets Using a Branch Project.
Must merge each item in
project individually.
• Branch and merge components Yes. N-way merge
• User definable attributes
• Worksets (virtual workspaces)
• Work in progress/to-do lists
• Suspend components (Obsolete)
• Create relationships between items
• Impact Analysis Capability
• Configurable GUI interface
• Metadata database model
• Manage directories and directory
structures.
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production.
Have a defined and automated
process, and issues are linked
to code.
Can rebuild old versions.
PVCS Dimensions
Adds capability to control
when a person can perform
which task on what items.
Several build tools are offered,
including PVCS Configuration
Builder.
Text and graphical reports.
Open database also allows
external tools to create reports.
Complete integration of
version and issue management
in a single product.
NFS mounting not required,
uses standard TCP/IP. Also
supports OS/390.
Yes
Yes. N-way merge
Yes
Yes
Yes. Pending lists.
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes. Screens, fields, sorting,
etc. can all be configured.
Yes. Oracle runtime database
included with product.
Yes
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Issue Management PVCS Professional
• Interface to Version Control Can check-out/in
components from Version
Manager archives.
TrackerLink available in
Version Manager GUI.
• Re-assign requests to different projects Export/Import only.
• Database PVCS Tracker requires
existing installation of
Oracle, Microsoft SQL
Server, or Sybase SQL
Server.
• Create parent/child requests
• Create relationships between requests
• Create Work Packages
• Multiple type of change requests
Build Management PVCS Professional
Includes PVCS
Configuration Builder,
which accesses PVCS
Version Manager archives
to build executables.
Process/Workflow Management PVCS Professional
Promotion Models and
event triggers provide
logical lifecycle. One
model per project.
Baseline Management PVCS Professional
• Bill of materials / Made of List Footprinting is stored
inside executables and
.dll’s.
• Distributed and parallel builds
Release Management PVCS Professional
Promotion Model support
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PVCS Dimensions
Complete integration of
version and issue management
in a single product.
Yes
Oracle runtime database
included with product.
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
PVCS Dimensions
Several build tools, including
PVCS Configuration Builder,
which accesses files in item
libraries to build executables.
PVCS Dimensions
Process engine supports
multiple lifecycles for
different development objects
(code, issues, baselines, etc.)
Users can be notified when
new tasks are assigned.
PVCS Dimensions
Stored in the metadata
database.
Yes
PVCS Dimensions
Complete support links
baselines to builds/releases to
customers.
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Benefits of Moving from PVCS Professional to PVCS Dimensions

PVCS Professional customers who are ready to move up to PVCS Dimensions
will see the following additional benefits.

Tightly Integrated Version and Issue Management

PVCS Dimensions’ total integration between version management and issue
management provides tight control over software assets by (optionally)
allowing files to be changed only in response to an approved change document.
This integration between version and issue management virtually eliminates
unapproved (and often untested and unreliable) changes to software.
Tightly integrated version and issue management provide an audit trail because
each change to a software asset is associated with a change document that
explains the reason for the change and shows who approved it.

Process/Workflow Management
By default, even basic SCM (version, issue and build management) imposes
some process. But formally defined and automated process and workflow
management is more. It is key to enabling continual improvement at
progressively higher levels of maturity. PVCS Dimensions with process and
workflow management capability doesn’t just define the way things should be
done — it institutionalizes the way things are actually done and assures that
the process is enforced.
PVCS Dimensions process and workflow management capabilities allow
organizations to define, control, and tailor their development workflow
including change, build and release processes across the entire software
lifecycle. The result is significant improvement in consistency, repeatability,
and predictability of development effort and products.
Dimensions maintains relationships among development objects. These
relationships provide the foundation for impact analysis, which allows the
impact, on the entire system, of a proposed change to be evaluated before the
change is made.

Baseline Management
Large enterprise projects can contain literally thousands of configuration items,
and it is impossible for even the best project leader or manager to manage this
level of detail. Baseline management addresses this problem by grouping
configuration items in a way that is important to management.
PVCS Dimensions allows baselines to be managed as any other configuration
item. Access to baselines can be limited to prevent uncontrolled “quick fixes”
that don’t get incorporated into the development code. Baselines can have
lifecycles which allow them to move through predefined states such as “in
system test” or “passed system test”. Additionally, baselines can be revised by
adding change requests. Lifecycles allow the baseline to be managed as a high

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level entity while preserving a complete audit trail of every change to the
baseline.

Release Management
PVCS Dimensions’ release management extends the development/test processes
into production so potential disconnects are removed. For example, “filters” can
be applied to the system test baseline to consistently select all the items that are
meant to be included in the release. Release management ensures that the bill-
of-materials is correct and, just as important, it provides documentation
describing exactly what files were included in the build.
Release management provides full traceability, which records the details of
customers/sites who have received product releases and which releases have
been issued to them. Therefore, when files need to be changed, analysts can
query where and in what manner the file is being used. A complete audit trail is
provided.
Additionally, release management protects the released files from
unauthorized modification thus closing the backdoor whereby developers can
make “quick fixes.”
PVCS Dimensions’ release management products can also create a delta
release, which includes those items which have changed since the previous
specified release was made. Delta releases can greatly decrease installation time
and conversely reduce the amount of time that the production system must be
off-line.

Increased Scalability
PVCS Dimensions’ n-tier client/server architecture and Oracle RDBMS allow
virtually unlimited scalability.

OS/390 Support
In addition to supporting the most popular client/server platforms, PVCS
Dimensions supports the OS/390. PVCS Dimensions OS/390 support brings
many benefits to the enterprise.
• Common development and release procedures and practices can be
established across the enterprise for both the mainframe and client/server
environments.
• All software assets, whether stored in mainframe or client/server
environments, can be accessed from anywhere in the enterprise.
• Enterprise-wide change management is supported because change requests
and defect reports can be entered, managed and tracked against
configuration items from mainframes, UNIX or Windows platforms.
• Software assets can be shared and accessed across the enterprise regardless
of the platform.
• Cost of ownership is reduced because the enterprise need not learn and
support multiple SCM systems.

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• Reporting is standardized across the enterprise with single scalable

repository.

Increased Network Performance and Security

All PVCS Dimensions components communicate via an enhanced protocol. This
protocol, running over TCP/IP, reduces network traffic and eliminates the need
for the creation of temporary files on the Dimensions server when checking files
in or out. The overall effect is higher performance and secure communications.
The networking support also provides improved security by encrypting all
Dimensions commands and, optionally, encrypting all items moved within
Dimensions. The new protocol simplifies PVCS Dimensions access through
firewalls across a LAN/WAN environment.

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Also available at authorized

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Reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. PVCS is a
registered trademark and PVCS
Professional, PVCS Dimensions, PVCS
Tracker, PVCS Version Manager, PVCS
Configuration Builder and MERANT are
trademarks of MERANT. Other trademarks
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