HCL Webinar Series – HCL VersionVault Delivers Version Control and More

HCL is an interesting organization. You may know them as an Indian company that provides software and hardware services.  At about $10B US and over 110,000 employees working around the world, they are indeed a force in the industry. They’ve also created a software company called HCL Software that develops tools and technologies that are of interest to IC designers. The webinar discussed here presents VersionVault. HCL VersionVault delivers version control and more to the designer.

HCL Software is doing a series of webinars on their DevOps offerings. For the uninitiated, the term refers to the combination of software development (Dev) and IT operations (Ops). It’s all about improving the system development lifecycle and the quality of the delivered product. On July 22, they conducted a webinar on VersionVault. The format of the webinar included live video of the presenters interacting with each other with some slides only at the beginning. I found the format and style of this delivery to be quite engaging.

The webinar was presented by Steve Boone, head of product management at HCL Software DevOps, Howie Bernstein, product manager for HCL Compass and HCL VersionVault and John Kohl, chief architect for VersionVault (for 27 years).

Webinar Content

Steve began by providing on overview of the DevOps portfolio from HCL Software.  Steve presented an eye-popping statistic – by 2022 80% of revenue growth will depend on digital offerings and operations. Makes you think long and hard about what’s important. Steve presented a compelling overview of the acceleration of digital transformation and what it means to all of us and business health in general.

This discussion alone is worth watching the webinar. You can find an overview of the secure, data-driven business agility offered by HCL DevOps here.

Howie then weighed in on just what VersionVault is. It turns out there are a lot of descriptions for this product. Paraphrasing, here are a few:

• Version control software
• Enterprise class (unlimited scalability and the ability to handle very complex structures)
• Easy to use with a built-in configuration management process
• Good for regulated industries thanks to built-in authoritative auditing capabilities
• Reduces time for embedded system development
• Can synchronize design among a globally disparate development team

Bottom line: HCL VersionVault delivers version control and more. So, the leading question posed by Howie was: “OK, if it’s so great, how come I never heard of it?”  The response is quite interesting – you have heard of it, but as another name. VersionVault is functionally equivalent to ClearCase, except it is fully 64-bit on all platforms. I’m willing to bet most folks have heard of ClearCase, so this was starting to get really interesting.

What followed was a detailed discussion from John about the unique and powerful capabilities of VersionVault. The VersionVault virtual file system delivers some significant advantages. To learn more, you’ll need to watch the webinar. The rest of the webinar consisted of a back-and-forth conversation between Howie and John as they discussed the product and fielded questions from the audience. I felt like I was eavesdropping on a planning meeting – very engaging and informative. The chemistry between these two folks made the whole thing work really well.

I’ll conclude with a short description of VersionVault from the VersionVault web page:

HCL VersionVault can help organizations by balancing flexibility with the organization’s need for control. It provides controlled access to soft assets, including code, requirements, design documents, models, schematics, test plans, and test results. User authentication and authoritative audit trails help your organization meet compliance requirements with the minimal administrative hassle for you. With access virtually anytime, anywhere, HCL VersionVault gives you the freedom to work efficiently where and when you need.

The webinar is a little under an hour, but the time flew by for me, it was that good. You can watch the webinar here.

CDN Live

As CDN Live is approaching, you can visit HCL’s virtual booth there as well. They will have a broad range of staff at the booth to answer questions and interact with visitors in real-time via online chat. There will be lots of downloadable content to explain how they can help your design process. It’s definitely worth a look.

They’ve even provided a code for instant approval for those who choose to register: SilSP6