Final answer:
Release Management is a part of IT Service Management to oversee the process of deploying software releases. It involves coordination among IT teams to maintain the integrity of the live environment and ensure that the release meets quality and security standards.
Step-by-step explanation:
What is Release Management?
Release Management is a critical aspect of software engineering that involves the process of managing, planning, scheduling, and controlling a software build through different stages and environments, including testing and deploying software releases. It ensures that there is a structured approach to the deployment of changes to IT systems, ensuring that all changes introduced are reliable and can be traced. It's part of the broader field of IT Service Management (ITSM) and is associated with the development lifecycle and DevOps practices.
The goal of Release Management is to ensure that the integrity of the live environment is protected and that the correct components are released. It involves coordination between various IT teams and stakeholders, including developers, operations staff, and QA testers to make sure that the software delivery is successful and meets the necessary quality and security standards. Release Managers typically oversee this process, providing visibility into the release process for all involved parties and ensuring that policies and procedures are followed.
Release Management is used not only in large software development projects but also in smaller teams and can be applied to various types of releases whether they be major, minor, emergency fixes, or cumulative updates. It promotes both speed and reliability within the software release process.