Traceability Enhancement Technique for Dependency Relations of Software Artifacts based on the Integration of Software Configuration Management System and Personal Workspace

Abstract

The ability to trace change history and dependency relations of software artifacts which are continuously changed has been recognized as an important factor that support quality management activities such as verification, validation, and testing in software system development process. General software configuration management systems provide tracing information for artifacts only within the configuration management system, and it does not go further to changes that occur within personal workspace. This paper provides a solution that helps tracing down not only changes of configuration items but also change history of artifacts existent in personal workspace through the integration of configuration management system and personal workspace. Furthermore, in cases of artifacts which are included in a configuration item, this paper provides a solution that support tracing dependency relations between the artifacts by identifying their version links. For the integration of configuration management system and personal workspace, a revision of configuration item is connected to the artifact's version of the workspace by the tagging mechanism, and traceability for change history and dependency relations of artifacts can be managed more effectively through integrated change process.