ActiveCM

[Z. Joe Wang]

Anyone out there has any experience with Telelogic's ActiveCM? We are
in the process of picking a SourceSafe replacement and Telelogic
appears to satisfy what we need. However, our developers are used to
the tight SCC integration in Visual Studio. But it appears with .NET,
we have to use ActiveCM, which appears buggy when they demoed it to
us. Is it a resource hog? Does it interfere with other programs
(e.g., virus detection)?

Thanks,
-joe

[Fran_CM]

zjoewang@hotmail.com (Z. Joe Wang) wrote in message news:<865f660.0306232048.21b1387c@posting.google.com>... Anyone out there has any experience with Telelogic's ActiveCM? We are in the process of picking a SourceSafe replacement and Telelogic appears to satisfy what we need. However, our developers are used to the tight SCC integration in Visual Studio. But it appears with .NET, we have to use ActiveCM, which appears buggy when they demoed it to us. Is it a resource hog? Does it interfere with other programs (e.g., virus detection)? Thanks, -joe

Joe,

Just my opinion but you're better off sticking with standard version
management tools: PVCS, Clearcase, Visual Source Safe, etc. Version
Management is a long-term commitment. As a result, questions such as
support quality, longevity of the company, and the ability to find and
discuss situation with peers are all important factors.

Hope this viewpoint helps a bit.

Fran White

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Henrik_J=F6nsson?=]

> Just my opinion but you're better off sticking with standard version management tools: PVCS, Clearcase, Visual Source Safe, etc. Version Management is a long-term commitment. As a result, questions such as support quality, longevity of the company, and the ability to find and discuss situation with peers are all important factors.

Just to clarify things here. ActiveCM is an addon to the CM Synergy
application. CM Synergy is a full featured CM system, in the same
class as Clearcase and Dimenision. You don't have to use ActiveCM.
It's optional. There is also an integration into Visual Studio.
ActiveCM is targeted to people that doesn't use CM tool that often and
don't need all the gory details in the standard UI.

Regards

Henrik

[Corey]

zjoewang@hotmail.com (Z. Joe Wang) wrote in message news:<865f660.0306232048.21b1387c@posting.google.com>... Anyone out there has any experience with Telelogic's ActiveCM? We are in the process of picking a SourceSafe replacement and Telelogic appears to satisfy what we need. However, our developers are used to the tight SCC integration in Visual Studio. But it appears with .NET, we have to use ActiveCM, which appears buggy when they demoed it to us. Is it a resource hog? Does it interfere with other programs (e.g., virus detection)? Thanks, -joe


Joe,

Telelogic CM Synergy is a full blown CM tool that is peered with
ClearCase/UCMPVCS Dimensions and IntraSoft AllChange. The ActiveCM
portion is an optional add-on that your developers don't have to use
if they don't want to. The tool also supports a direct integration
with SCCI compliant IDEs, so you won't have any problems integrating
the tool with the .NET environment. Since Telelogic is a very big and
expensive tool, you might also want to take a look at some of the new
entrants in the CM space to see if they might fit your needs. Take a
look at SpectrumSCM (www.spectrumscm.com), Quartet(www.scmlabs.com)
and SurroundSCM(www.seapine.com). These tools have all of the features
found in the larger more established players but have a much better
price point and ROI.

Good luck

--Corey

[Frank Schophuizen]

> [...] These tools have all of the features found in the larger more established players but have a much better price point and ROI.

A sidestep from the original discussion:
How do you determine Return On Investment (ROI)?

When comparing prices of tools, you must also compare capabilities of the
tools. But to determine ROI, you need to take into account the whole chain
of impacts up to the business objectives. This includes business impact of
timing and quality, induced costs (e.g. maintenance, support and training),
change of risk, etc. In that case you should not only take the tool into
account, but also the supplier organisation, your own infrastructure,
abilities to automate processes (and save human effort)

For example:
If a cheaper tool supports feature X (which is a necessasity for the
organisation) but because of the limitations compared to a more expensive
tool it requires 5 minutes more from each developer, then this is 5 x 40 =
200 minutes per developer per year. Given a $100 hourly rate (including
business losses due to latedeliveries, etc.), this is over $300 per year per
developer. This alone may cover for the difference in price.

If a cheaper tool increases the risk that the CM system is inoperable for a
week per year by 5%, then you should take 5% of 1 week = 2 hours extra
downtime per year. With an hourly rate of $100, this is $200 per developer
per year.

If you have a problem that makes your CM system inoperable for 30% and the
support from the tool supplier takes you 1 week extra to resolve the issue
(because their support organisation is lesser organised, or because the user
community is smaller, or whatever), and the chance that this kind of problem
occurs in a year is 50%, you should count for an extra downtime of 50% of
30% of 1 week per year = 15% of 1 week per year = 6 hours per developer per
year = $600 per developer per year.


In other words, don't conclude too lightly that a cheaper tool has better
ROI.

[=?ISO-8859-15?Q?Jes=FAs_M=2E_NAVARRO?=]

Hi, Frank:

Frank Schophuizen escribió en comp.software.config-mgmt:
[...] These tools have all of the features found in the larger more established players but have a much better price point and ROI. A sidestep from the original discussion: How do you determine Return On Investment (ROI)?

Simply put down, you just can't do it.
When comparing prices of tools, you must also compare capabilities of the tools. But to determine ROI, you need to take into account the whole chain

Of course. And since you just can't evaluate how much time/money has been
saved because of the use of the SCM tool, specially before the fact, you
end up taking the word of your local guru. And that's what the pointy
haired people like the less.

The most you can have is, if you have a long enough track of similar
projects, telling that this project that used the new tool has been cheaper
and asume that was because the tool (asumption it is: you won't know it for
sure, and that's after the fact: it won't give you data to defend the
purchase). The other battlefield is speculative and after-the-fact too:
when your SCM tool saves your ass and you try to valuate what the
expenditures would have been if the tool weren't there.
of impacts up to the business objectives.

That's about the fact. SCM gives you easier way to achieve your objectives
(thus, it is *asumed* that you *probably* will save some money) and it
makes your procedures (along with good engineering practices, holistic CM
practices and blah, blah) safer and more reproductible. In the end it's
alike to buy an insurance policy: what's the ROI of an insurance policy?
Most you can do is evaluate how much can cost you to recover from a given
catastrophic scenario, then give it (a more or less ficticious) probability
and then match it against the policy price. After you present the dossier,
your boss will decide if the company buys the policy or not.
--
SALUD,
Jesús
***
jesus_navarro@undominio.net
***