Agile Configuration Management

I love configuration management! “But”, you ask, “isn’t configuration management boring?” Well, configuration management can be boring and tedious if you do it manually. With modern tools it is not all that bad. Even if it is boring, that is out-weighed by the sheer importance of proper agile configuration management for a successful software development team.

The Importance of Agile Configuration Management

In the last few weeks, I have received several reminders about the importance of agile configuration management. I have had a renewed discussion with a client about what constitutes a version. I was invited to give another lecture on configuration management at Linköping University.

Source: Wikipedia | CC BY SA 2.5

Agile configuration management relies heavily on software configuration management tools such as Subersion and GIT. Image from Wikipedia, used under CC BY SA 2.5.

We’ve all heard the phrase “But it works on my computer!” That phrase is the essence of the importance of configuration management. A configuration is simply a description of all the components that constitute our product. Think of it like a list of ingredients or a shipping manifest. Configuration management is about consciously managing configurations.