Patent ID: 7992141

Claim:
A method for building computer software, comprising the steps of: executing a first build process, said first build process binding a referencing program to a referenced program and recording a first signature of said referenced program at the time of said binding step in said referencing program, said first signature uniquely identifying a version of said referenced program used by said first build process to build said referencing program; subsequently executing a second build process, said second build process: (a) automatically comparing said first signature with each supported signature of a plurality of supported signatures associated with a current version of said referenced program, each of said plurality of supported signatures corresponding to a different respective version of said referenced program supported by said current version of said referenced program, said plurality of supported signatures including a first supported signature uniquely identifying said current version of said referenced program and a second supported signature different from said first supported signature uniquely identifying a version of said referenced program previous to said current version of said referenced program; (b) automatically determining whether to re-build said referencing program based on results of said automatically comparing step, said automatically determining step determining to re-build said referencing program if said first signature does not match any supported signature of said plurality of supported signatures associated with said current version of said referenced program; and (c) automatically re-building said referencing program responsive to a determination made by said automatically determining step.