Boxing Configuration Management – Configuration Change Management Meets the 4‐Box Development Model

Abstract Systems Engineering and Configuration Management are essential ingredients in development of complex, safety‐critical systems of today. However, our experience within the fighter aircraft industry shows different understanding of how to best manage and control development between the Systems Engineering and Configuration Management communities. This is particularly true when a system is developed incrementally, and where there are multiple concurrent change‐controlled development activities. Using the 4‐box development model as a basis for incremental development, the paper highlights the nature of development planning and Configuration Change Management. Three types of change items are identified, to capture the needs to handle: 1) Long‐term, static changes with a large scope to be agreed with the stakeholders. 2) Short‐term, dynamic changes with small scope for each development team. 3) Short‐term, static changes with a varying scope depending on what is available for integration into a specific product configuration. Finally, this model of handling changes is exemplified by a toy example, showing the relationships between the changes and flexibility in handling re‐planning during the long‐term development. With the proposed approach, we hope to narrow the gap between the Systems Engineering and Configuration Management communities.