Customer Reviews

The Art of ClearCase® Deployment: The Secrets to Successful Implementation

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

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.

I just purchased this book and made my initial pass through it and I'm thoroughly dissappointed. The authors state that this is book to bridge the gap between other technical books. It fails at that.

I worked for Rational as ClearCase/ClearQuest field rep. I currently work for an organization with ClearCase, ClearQuest and UCM as the preferred SCM solution with over 400 users.

I purchased this book looking for a resource that I could use with upper management in driving toward release driven development process with strong support from an SCM and deployment perspective.

I do not need a technical manual, I have the proper technicians to create the solution. I was looking for a book that would help point us in the right direction. I was looking for a book that would help us in selling and working with non-technical people. I did not find it in this book.

This books is definitely not a technical book, and the authors state that up front. Unfortunately it is not a non-technical book either. A previous review hit the nail on the head; this book is great tool for Rational sales reps to market and sell their tools. It does nothing for assisting customers in using the tools.

The sad thing is that IBM/Rational is sitting on one the largest brain trusts of information and they cannot address this topic. There are over 100,000 employees with IBM and this is all they could come up with?

I'm taking the book back to the bookstore. I'm better off buying a Dilbert calendar!

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.

Nothing practical. Just a bunch of rah-rah in favor of the Clearcase product, the entire Rational Suite, and RUP in general. Pretty much a waste if you need to plan and execute a clearcase deployment. Probably useful to IBM/Rational account reps looking for some talking points about the products they're selling.

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.

Agree wholeheartedly with Javaman777. I thought this would be
THE book that would explain to me in Dick-and-Jane fashion how to use ClearCase. It's like the authors are standing on the deck looking through their binocs and every once in a while exclaiming "thar she blows!" when ClearCase is close. other than that, lots of practical advice on seafaring, ship design, the sea state, how to read cloud formations, how to deal with the ship's owners, etc. OK, say I have a very practical, nuts-and-bolts CM task staring me right in the face - how do I use ClearCase to get it done?? Skip all the hoopla, what is the first thing I see on the screen when ClearCase comes up??

It delivered it to me from Amazon.ca this afternoon together with the 2nd edition of "Software Configuration Management Strategies and IBM Rational ClearCase". I can still keep the later but I have to return this one immediately.

I can't even find the keywords of "mainline" and "composite baseline" from the index. Definitely I've brought a wrong book about ClearCase.

It's unbelievable how much this author can write without telling you about the specifics of using ClearCase. It's actually hard to find relevant information. Out of 432 pages I would estimate maybe 100 give you hard core information on how to use Clear Case. If you want a technical manual this book is not for you.