$Name $ in branches

[David D. Hagood]

I disagree with Mr. Woods on this: adding the branch ID to a build makes 
sense in my environment: I have several developers, each working on 
their own branch of an embedded system. As needed, the load their code 
into target systems for development. Since the number of developers is 
larger than the number of target systems available to do development on, 
there needs to be some reuse of the systems. Being able to quickly 
identify that "Oh, this unit has Bruce's build, therefor I should 
contact him about this" would save a great deal of time.

Also, this would allow the software to automatically maintain unique 
setups across different development branches. Sometimes I want MY setups 
to be different from Bruce's, or I need to unit to access MY section of 
the server, rather than Bruce's. Again, if I can generate this 
automatically it saves an error prone step.

Additionally, I have to deal with marketing types who frequently come 
into the lab and stea..., er, borrow units to take to customers. 
Sometimes those units aren't as controlled as they should be. If the 
software can get the branch ID, it can correctly ID that is ISN'T a 
released version, and jump up and down and scream about it. This is the 
best solution I can come up with that management will allow (bludgeoning 
the individuals in question is not considered viable).

Actually, what I'd really rather see would be a $Branch$ or something 
that would allow me to contain that information.