Software Configuration Management: Under the Hood of Two Leading Tools

1
Software Configuration Management Under the
Hood of Two Leading Tools

• Presented by Andrew Wheeler Shane Marcus

2
Agenda

• Project Motivation
• CM Tools Investigated
• ClearCase
• Subversion (SVN)
• Comparison
• Future Work

3
Project Motivation

• Critical to software projects survival and
  completion
• A means of document control
• CMMIs demands
• Good SCM decisions can lead to a streamlining of
  the process
• Most popular SCM tools covered

4
ClearCase Background

• Initiated from DSEE
• Domain Software Engineering Environment
• Atria Software (Early 90s)
• Initially Released to UNIX Platforms
• Windows Support Came Later
• Rational Tool Alignment
• IBM Buyout

5
Subversion (SVN) Background

• Shell Scripts Written by Dick Grune
• Resolve Conflicted Code
• Merge Two Files
• Brian Berliner Transformed Scripts (89)
• CVS was Born
• Subversion Derived from CVS
• Marketed as a Compelling Replacement to CVS
• Built by CollabNet, Inc.

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Comparison Areas
Evaluation
Networking
Atomic Commits
Directory Support
File Support
Remote Repository
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Differences in Comparison
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Related Work

• User Driven Evaluation
• Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
• Used as repository for course materials and
  collaboration source among professors
• Feedback to students on coursework through SVN
• Collaboration among teams and backup structure
  for students

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Related Work (cont)

• Collaboration and SCM
• COVEN
• Presents key issues facing current SCM tools
• Branching and Merging
• Revision history and Reverting
• Labeling and Tagging

10
Future Work

• Perform study of software projects who use SCM
  tools
• Collect needs through surveys and rate them
  against the features of a given SCM tool
• Collect metrics on how quickly a project can
  setup a repository structure
• Collect metrics on how much time is spent
  performing a given activity with the same amount
  of SLOC changes per SCM tool
• Compare SCM tool usage to staff size

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Conclusion

• ClearCase vs. Subversion (SVN)
• Feature Sets Nearly the Same
• Proprietary vs. Open Source
• Significant Cost Difference
• Initial Setup Time
• Difficult to Eliminate Biases
• Restricted Evaluation / Training Opportunity
• ClearCase On-line Only Evaluation
• Relied on Work Exposure to Product