The development of a configuration control tool

The development of a flexible configuration control tool for a dynamic software system is discussed. The configuration management tool provides the ability to automatically install or remove software patches from any software baseline. Its innovative concept is that configuration changes are temporary as long as desired. Installation and removal of patches requires only shutting down the application code, setting the desired configuration through a user-friendly interface, and then restarting the application. If a patch survives the rigors of operations for a few weeks, it is safe to permanently incorporate it into the baseline. If a patch fails while in the temporary state, it can easily be removed. The results of using this tool are discussed