Software Configuration Management Process Interview Question

by Brenda
(Fargo, North Dakota, USA)

Software Configuration Management Process Interview Question

Mostly I like to get the candidate to talk about what they do and have them explain the why.

This usually helps me to know if they understand SCM.

I like to have them explain their SCM Process.

As they are doing this, I like to ask questions to find out if they know why they are performing this process.

For instance, I will ask them to describe the steps in their software builds.

If they tell me they label their code, I will ask to them to describe the reasons they do that.

Another example would be if they talk about creating a new or clean directory structure to build.

I will ask them why they do that.

If they struggle to explain that they do these steps to:

1. Ensure the source code versions for the build labeled to ensure reproducibility.

2. Make sure that they build in a clean work space to ensure that they do not have unknown build dependencies.

I can clearly see they do not understand why they are following the process.

They may be able to do the work, but someone else did the thinking for them.