We tried hard in this book to be practical, to show the code as the Open Source precept mandates. We wish our reader will indulge us now the right to draw some more abstract, more theoretical conclusions, but bear with us until the end: we'll drive back to practical proposals.
There are good reasons to feel concerned with the future of ClearCase. As we saw, there are reasons as well to believe that ClearCase has still much to contribute to SCM, which itself has by far not got the attention it deserves in today's software development. So, in short, what place may ClearCase have in the future; does it even have any?
This question is a natural, and a difficult one, for people having already invested in ClearCase, or thinking of acquiring competences in SCM.
It is commonplace to read extremely negative comments on ClearCase, especially in Open Source contexts.
We'll consider ClearCase from three points of view—of IBM, of software engineering at large, and of the Open Source. Then we'll draw our conclusions, and offer an agenda to our readers.