<p>Our automated build machine needs to archive the version numbers of the OS plus various tools used during each build.  (In case we ever need to replicate exactly the same build later on, perhaps when the machine is long dead.)</p>

<p>I see the command "msinfo32.exe" can be used to dump a whole load of system version information, which we might as well archive.</p>

<p>Does anyone know of a way to easily archive the version numbers of the Visual Studio tools?</p>

<p>What mechanisms do other developers use to gather this kind of information for archive purposes?</p>

<hr>

<p>Extra information for Fabio Gomes.</p>

<p>I agree with you that in 5 years time it'll probably be impossible to recreate the exact OS and tool configuration (down to the nearest security update).  Unfortunately this really comes from a contractual requirement.  As part of our deliverable to a customer we must provide a copy of all source code and clear instructions on exactly how to replicate the build.  It's probably impossible for us to meet this requirement perfectly.</p>

<p>So - I'll just mark your answer as correct (I agree with you that it's practically impossible), and get on with playing with the rest of stack overflow. :)</p>

<p>PS. It would be really great if stack overflow supported replies to answers instead of having to edit the original question.. But I see it has <a href="http://stackoverflow.uservoice.com/pages/general/suggestions/14403" rel="noreferrer">already been denied</a>.</p>

[{'answer_id': 6083, 'author': 'Brandon Wood', 'author_id': 423, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/423', 'pm_score': 0, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>OpenID seems to be a very good alternative to writing your own user management/authentication piece.  I'm seeing more and more sites using OpenID these days, so the barrier to entry for your users should be relatively low.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 6084, 'author': 'Marcel Levy', 'author_id': 676, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/676', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>I like OpenID, but I'd still go with the email address, unless your user community is very technically savvy. It's still much easier for most people to understand and remember.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 6088, 'author': 'Jake McGraw', 'author_id': 302, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/302', 'pm_score': 6, 'selected': True, 'text': '<p><strong>EMAIL ADDRESS</strong></p>\n\n<p>Rational</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Users don\'t change emails very often</li>\n<li>Removes the step of asking for username and email address, which you\'ll need anyway</li>\n<li>Users don\'t often forget their email address (see number one)</li>\n<li>Email will be unique unless the user already registered for the site, in which case forward them to a forgot your password screen</li>\n<li>Almost everyone is using email as the primary login for access to a website, this means the rate of adoption shouldn\'t be affected by the fact that you\'re asking for an email address</li>\n</ol>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><strong>Update</strong></p>\n\n<p>After registration, be sure to ask the user to create some kind of username, don\'t litter a public site with their email address! Also, another benefit of using an email address as a login: you won\'t need any other information (like password / password confirm), just send them a temp password through the mail, or forgo passwords altogether and send them a one-use URL to their email address every time they\'d like to login (see: <a href="http://mugshot.org/main" rel="noreferrer">mugshot.org</a>)</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 6089, 'author': 'Tanerax', 'author_id': 567, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/567', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>I personally would say Email w/ Verification, OpenId is a great idea but I find that finding a provider that your already with is a pain, I only had an openId for here cause just 2 days before beta I decided to start a blog on blogspot. But everyone on the internet has an email address, especially when dealing with businesses, people aren't very opt to using there personal blog or whatnot for a business login.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 6091, 'author': 'ricree', 'author_id': 121, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/121', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>I think that OpenID is definitely worth looking at.  Besides giving you a framework in which to provide a unified id for customers, it can also provide large businesses with the ability to manage their own logins and provide a common login across all products that they use, including your own.  This isn't that large of a benefit now when OpenId is still relatively rare, but as more products begin to use it, I suspect that the ability to use a common company OpenId login for each employee could become a good selling point.</p>\n\n<p>Since you're mostly catering to businesses, I don't think that it's all that unreasonable to offer to host the OpenId accounts yourself.  I just think that the extra flexibility will benefit your customers.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 6093, 'author': 'Tim Sullivan', 'author_id': 722, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/722', 'pm_score': 3, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>OpenID is very slick, and something you should seriously consider as it basically removes the requirement to save local usernames and passwords and worry about authentication.</p>\n\n<p>A lot of sites nowadays are using both OpenID and their own, giving users the option.</p>\n\n<p>If you do decide to roll your own, I'd recommend using the email address. Be careful, though, if you are creating something that groups users by an account (say, a company that has several users). In this case, the email address might be used more than once (if they do work for more than one company, for example), and you should allow that.</p>\n\n<p>HTH!</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 6098, 'author': 'salt.racer', 'author_id': 757, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/757', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>If most of your customers are mostly businesses then I think that using anything other than email creates problems for your customers. Most people are comfortable with email address login and since they are a business customer will likely want to use their work email rather than a personal account. OpenID creates a situation where there is a third party involved and many businesses don't like a third party involved.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 63404, 'author': 'Community', 'author_id': -1, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/-1', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': "<p>If you use an email address for ID, don't require that it be verified. I learned the hard way about this when one day suddenly the number of signups at my site drastically decreased. It turns out that the entire range of IP addresses including my site's IP was blacklisted. It took a long time to resolve it. In other cases, I have seen Gmail marking very legitimate emails as spam, and that can cause trouble too.</p>\n\n<p>It's good to verify the email address, but don't make it block signups.</p>\n"}, {'answer_id': 63455, 'author': 'dbr', 'author_id': 745, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/745', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<blockquote>\n  <p>Right now our customers are mostly businesses.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>People seem to be missing that line. If it\'s for a business, requiring them to login via OpenID really isn\'t very practical. They\'d either have to use an external OpenID provider, or their poor tech people would have to setup and configure a company OpenID.</p>\n\n<p>If this were "should StackOverflow require OpenID for login" or "Should my blog-comment-system allow you to identify yourself via OpenID", my answer would be "absolutely!", but in this case, I don\'t think OpenID would be a good fit.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 68379, 'author': 'dynamic', 'author_id': 10667, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/10667', 'pm_score': 1, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>If you are looking at OpenID you should check out <a href="http://eaut.org/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://eaut.org/</a> and <a href="http://emailtoid.net" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://emailtoid.net</a>.  Basically you can accept email addresses for a login and behind the scenes translate them to OpenID without the user having to know anything.  Its pretty slick stuff...</p>\n'}]
['https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/6085', 'https://Stackoverflow.com', 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/755/']