Patent ID: 8438541

Claim:
A system for extending software change management to handle unmanaged artifacts comprising: one or more processors, which are hardware processors; one or more non-transitory storage mediums storing digitally encoded information; an object comprising of a reference stored within a software change management (SCM) system, comprising the one or more processors and the one or more non-transitory storage mediums, wherein the reference is a linkage to a remote managed artifact stored within a repository, wherein the at least one reference lacks artifact restrictions, wherein the artifact restrictions are traditional software change management artifact restrictions associated with a managed artifact within the SCM, wherein the object is associated with a binding to the managed artifact stored within the SCM; and an SCM engine able to perform operations on the object in a manner consistent with a managed artifact; and a portion of metadata associated with the object, wherein the metadata comprises of at least a name information and a location information associated with the remote managed artifact, wherein the location information is a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI), wherein the URI is associated with a source code repository.