The Role of Configuration Management Within Agile Environments

This report explores the critical role of Configuration Management (CM) within agile environments. It begins by introducing CM as an engineering discipline that regulates items through audit, control, and reporting, and emphasizes its adaptability to agile development methodologies. The research aims to reflect on CM's function within agile environments, ensuring the integrity of agile principles while adjusting CM to accommodate the iterative and incremental nature of agile methodologies. Key aspects such as 'thinking small' to support smaller work increments, the need for individual workspaces, and automated merging are discussed. The research employs a secondary research method, including articles, journals, and case studies, supported by interpretivism as the research philosophy and a deductive approach. Findings highlight CM's effectiveness in comparing requirements with deliverables and tracking builds. A real-life case study illustrates how CM maps the software development life cycle and supports product development, concluding that the success of software development methodologies is significantly influenced by CM. The report references key sources such as Abrahamsson et al. (2017), Aiello & Sachs (2010), and Highsmith (2009).