Glossary

Applications: Release Control applications are logical representations of real-world applications that are being released as part of release trains or release packages. Application examples include a software product, a set of related components, and shared services. You may assign an application version to a release package to track that information.
Approvals: Approvals may be required to allow a release train to proceed to the final deployment stage; to validate that a release train may exit a stage based on stage gate exit criteria; and to confirm that pre-defined milestones for release trains have been reached by a certain date.
Deployment Paths: Sequences of environments through which release packages progress during the release cycle.
Deployment Tasks: Include the details of what is to be deployed, what order they are to be deployed in, and what needs to be done before, during, and after they are deployed.

Deployment Units: A packaged set of deployment-ready files and metadata that is associated with a deployment task. Examples include Deployment Automation component versions, Dimensions CM baselines, and ChangeMan ZMF change packages.
Environments: Logical representations of the physical environments used by your organization. Typical environments include testing, staging, and production.
Gates: Points in the workflow where exit criteria may be validated and approved as met before the release train can move to the next stage. In the default implementation, gates are defined at the end of each of the first three release train stages, Plan, Do, and Check, and are monitored through Planning, Development, and QA Exit Criteria.
Milestones: Date-based activities against which progress can be measured. Milestones are typically interim deliverables within a life cycle stage.
Release Approvals: Built-in approval items that may be required for the release train to enter the Scoping, QA, and final stages. The default approval names are Train, Development, and Executive. Up to four levels of approval may be defined for each of these.
Release Data: A process app whose main purpose is to manage the release data for Release Control, such as release type and application version.
Release Elements: Entities or objects that support your release processes, such as applications, environments, release types, and deployment paths.
Release Packages: Contain all the information needed to deploy deployment units to or run processes in environments.
Release Trains: Calendar-based management of a set of release packages across various life cycle stages.
Release Type: A user-defined category for release trains and release packages. Release type values are stored in the Release Data process app's auxiliary data, and you can easily add values that are appropriate for your implementation. The default values are Major, Minor, and Emergency.
Requests: Represent work items in response to a business need.
Stages: Logical divisions of the process app workflows that represent a roll-up of the states within the swimlanes of the workflow.
Task Templates: Templates of ordered deployment tasks.
Timelines: Present the overall status for release trains in a Gantt chart format.