Configuration management implementation on industrial environments

Resum

Configuration Management [CM] is a Systems Engineering process for establishing and maintaining consistency of a product´s performance, functional, and physical attributes with its requirements, design, and operational information throughout its life. CM is the practice of controlling changes methodically so that a system keeps its traceability over time. CM programs and plans provide technical and administrative direction to the development and implementation of the procedures, functions, services, tools, processes, and resources required to successfully develop and support a complex system. During system development, CM allows program management to track requirements throughout the life-cycle through acceptance and operations and maintenance. Ideally, the CM process is applied throughout the system lifecycle. Currently CM is widely applied in the most engineered complex and competitive products of the word from its inception until the disposal such as space crafts, satellites, information systems, planes, trains and vehicles, apart from that, in the civil engineering and other industrial engineering segments such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings. However, nor a scientific method neither systematically structured knowledge is followed in its application. The costs associated with a proper CM can be avoided by not bothering to employ it in an enterprise. If this is done, however, the company will probably pay instead in costs for unexpected failures from mistaken system components, because it was not possible to exactly identify which components were impacted by a change. Therefore, the lack of a proper CM, or its insufficient implementation, can be very expensive and sometimes can have catastrophic consequences such as failure of equipment or loss of life. Hence, throughout this research a systematically structured procedure for the practical implementation of CM is defined. This is done via the definition of a standardized procedure for identifying, selecting and categorizing the Configuration Items that will lead to the practical implementation of Configuration Management. The term configuration item (CI) has reference with the basic structural unit of a CM system. The CM system commands the life of the CIs through a combination of processes and tools by applying and allowing the fundamental elements of identification, change management, status accounting, and audits. This system avoids the introduction of failures related to lack of testing as well as of conflicts with other CIs. As a result, the proposed procedure guarantees quality and reproducibility on Configuration Management implementation while minimizing CM manager bias. Its goal is for CIs selection to be conducted in a fair, unbiased and repeatable manner.