The Art of Clearcase Deployment: The Secrets to Successful Implementation

The last two comments came from people who obviously were looking for a different kind of ClearCase manual, and I recommend that they take a look at Brian White's book, or search for specifics on IBM's website. This book is NOT an Administration Guide for ClearCase -- it was written to help project managers, analysts, technical writers, and others within a software company understand the components of a ClearCase deployment, and participate in its design and rollout. The overview above clearly indicates this, and I think we did a great job of covering these topics in the book: 1) Take on the role of change agent: prepare yourself for the challenge 2) Understand the value of ClearCase in your organization and gain consensus for implementing it 3) Map your software manufacturing process and plan your deployment 4) Model change-management: actors, use cases, and problem domains 5) Enforce and automate high-efficiency development policies and processes 6) Walk through build and release management: frequency, automation, communication, and more 7) Integrate ClearCase with existing tools and systems 8) Support efficient, error-free development across geographically dispersed teams 9) Plan for ClearCase hardware and size your VOB repository 10) Iterate your system to improve efficiency and reduce build- and test-cycle times 11) Avoid pitfalls and troubleshoot problems with ClearCase deployments Is there technical material that Admins and engineers will find useful? Definitely. But the bulk of this material is written for the broader team.

If a Clear Case deployment looms on the horizon for your company, then reading The Art of ClearCase Deployment from cover to cover is a priority for you, for your Steering Committee and for your deployment team. This book provides the map that can guide you through the wilderness of a tools deployment and ensure you realize the promised productivity gains and expense reductions. After two decades as business manager and a technology manager,I can say with confidence that lack of planning is the foremost reason that tools implementations fail to live up to their promise or just flat out fail. Maybe, planning does not go far enough. Maybe it is closer to the mark to say failure to understanding the ramifications of a tools implementation. This books covers clearly and concisely those very issues and pitfalls that recur over and over again. But the value of the information in this book is not limited to ClearCase deployments. It applies across the board as a primer for all tools and/or software deployments. Last but not least, this book is an enjoyable read: it is clear, concise and tinged with humor. So if you are in the IT industry, or if your business depends upon successfull IT implementations, this book is a must read.

Process flow and configuration management is daunting enough on a good day. Even for those of us with years of working with software development and version management, this book shares insights and practices that are well worth it's cover price. A must read for anyone involved in formal product development processes of any size.