Configuration Management: Theory, Practice, and Application details a comprehensive approach to configuration management from a variety of product development perspectives, including embedded and IT. It provides authoritative advice on how to extend products for a variety of markets due to configuration options. While configuration management is not necessarily a project management skill, the project’s change management function is part of an overall configuration management of the organization. Those project managers working in product development or manufacturing and logistics, should understand what happens when the project has an approach to configuration management, product and process change as well as project change, one manifestation of which is scope creep.
The book also describes the importance of configuration management to other parts of the organization. It supplies an overview of configuration management and its process elements to provide readers with a contextual understanding of the theory, practice, and application of CM.
Explaining what a configuration item is and what it implies, the book illustrates the interplay of configuration and data management with all enterprise resources during each phase of a product lifecycle. It also demonstrates the interrelationship of CM to functional resources.
Shedding light on current practice, the book describes CM baselines, configuration identification, management baseline changes, and acceptance criteria for end products. It also considers testing, inspection and evaluation, related CM standards, and reference data. Coverage includes the product life cycle, the supporting enterprise infrastructure, functional resources, product management, CM elements, data types, and control requirements.
Providing a systems perspective of the various elements of configuration and data management, the book explains how they relate to the enterprise and details proven risk management solutions for when things go wrong.