- Resource: in this context, we refer to an information resource - data that resides on a computer, not an actual physical entity.
- Configuration: a resource that identifies a set of revisions, versions, and/or states of some other resources (the workgroup is to determine if configuration can contain other configurations). In some systems, a configuration identifies an exact set of resources selected by the entity that created the configuration, as well as their versions; in other systems, a configuration may identify the state of a fixed set of resources, not limited to a client-determined set.
- Configuration management: the practices of managing configurations, their contents, their lifecycles - in particular, identifying and controlling changes to configurations.
- Baseline: an immutable configuration, that is, a snapshot in time of the state of a set of resources, including the links from those resources. For systems where a configuration does not identify a client-determined set of resources, a baseline may add that property.
- Version: a resource that indicate a specific state of another resource
- Version skew: tbd
- Revision: tbd
- Branch: tbd
Discussion from 2012-09-25
The term configuration item (often abbreviated to CI) is a fairly industry standard one, referenced in ISO9001-1003, MIL-STD-498 and elsewhere. A configuration item may have its own local content (properties) as well as be a structural element for decomposition. In that sense, a configuration is simply a CI that provides structure and is versioned like any other CI. Should the CM WG adopt this more standard term?
