[quote=flu]But in all seriousness, sounds like the perfect reason to push for CM/release management automation….[/quote]I am beginning to suspect that he does work with one of the more standard software config packages. I suspect he has to be there to ‘force’ the release system should something go wrong on a pushed update. Sounds that they may not have an internal system that they can use for full release testing. Some places go for a minimal set or none at all in terms of equipment for release testing. This results in a ‘scramble’ if something doesn’t go well on an update.

This is something I experienced where I worked previously. I ended going up to Alaska on releases (or other locations). Diff was, I am an engineer not CM. We would ‘backfill’ the SCM system if an emergency patch was needed. We would go to site with full software source on high end notebooks and full dev environment(encrypted boot and source disks if you plan to ask). If update didn’t “go as planned”, mods done to software at site and then CM’d later, followed by doing a baseline extract and compare against source copy of what we installed – after patches.