Introduction

This chapter introduces the Enterprise Release Option of ChangeMan ZMF.

Enterprise Release Option

The Enterprise Release Option (ERO), a selectable option of Serena ChangeMan ZMF, lets you consolidate software development in multiple change packages across multiple applications into releases that allow you to manage change at the enterprise level.

ERO provides a development path in each release that is based on progressive consolidation of application package components into areas until they reside in a single set of area libraries. This consolidation guarantees that concurrent development of system objects across the enterprise is detected and resolved to prevent regression or loss of new function.

ERO manages multiple releases in motion at the same time. Development in later releases uses components that are scheduled for installation in earlier releases. The use of release libraries in build processes is dynamic. Library concatenations and contents in build jobs change when the schedule relationship between releases is changed, or when applications and packages are added or removed from a release.

Release audit is an extension of the ChangeMan ZMF package audit. Release audit uses the dynamic relationships between releases in motion and the contents of each release to evaluate the relationships between components in a release and the contents, both current and anticipated, of baseline libraries. Since release audit uses the same information that build processing uses to generate library concatenations, it detects relationships that have been invalidated by a change in the relationship between releases or in the contents of a release.

ERO provides a flexible release architecture. You define releases, areas, and applications in ERO in a design that meets your configuration management needs. The release life cycle is controlled by a set of rules that can provide the latitude developers need for rapid system development early in a project, and the rigor required to protect your production environment at later steps of development, all within a single release.