What does ClearCase MultiSite do for your company?
The ClearCase MultiSite product is an add-on product to ClearCase used to distribute software development across
different geographical locations. For example, if your company has developers in Boston, San Francisco, and Bangalore, you
can give every developer local, real-time access to the source code repository (the versioned object base, or VOB). With
MultiSite, each site has its own copy (replica) of the VOB and all developers can work in parallel on the source files
without collisions.
Conflicting changes at different sites are prevented by ClearCase MultiSite's mastership scheme. Most ClearCase objects
can be mastered by only one replica, and only those developers who use that replica can modify the object. MultiSite
has facilities you can use to share control of source code elements so multiple developers can work on the same source
file in turn.
Instead of "throwing changes over the wall", you can use the synchronization tools supplied with ClearCase MultiSite to
send changes among replicas as often as site connectivity allows. If you have IP connections, you can use MultiSite's
shipping mechanism and configurable scripts to synchronize replicas frequently and automatically, giving developers at
other sites access to the very latest changes made at your site. If you do not have IP connections, you can choose
another synchronization method (for example, electronic mail, ftp, or magnetic tape) that's appropriate to your
configuration.
Do you need ClearCase MultiSite?
You should consider using ClearCase and ClearCase MultiSite if you need to distribute development among several
different locations and it's impractical for developers to remotely access VOBs. An additional benefit to using
MultiSite is that you can use it as a backup mechanism by creating a replica in a different region at your site and
synchronizing it frequently with the primary replica. By backing up the secondary replica instead of the primary
replica, you can allow development to continue unhindered in the primary replica. Also, if the primary replica's host
has a catastrophic disk crash, you can put the backup replica into use to avoid development downtime.
For more information about this
product, see the ClearCase MultiSite information
page on the IBM/Rational Web site, contact your
IBM sales representative, or see the ClearCase MultiSite Administrator's Manual.
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