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About publication baselines

A Baseline is an object in the repository that lists the specific versions of the maps, topics, images, and library topics used in a specific version of a publication.

What is in a baseline?

The baseline identifies all objects in the publication by their GUID and version.

A publication always contains one baseline and the baseline is specific to a publication version.

What's not in the baseline?

The baseline does not contain the following about the publish process:
  • languages
  • output formats
  • conditions

This allows you, even when frozen, to change condition settings and output formats to produce different, custom output from the frozen publication baseline.

Freezing a baseline

After you have identified and added all objects to your publication, you can freeze the information as the publication baseline. When frozen, you cannot change the content so the baseline can be used as an archive for your publication and as a means to identify the versions of the objects that were included in a publication.

The baseline of the publication is automatically frozen when you release an output release candidate, or when you manually freeze a baseline. This means that the baseline and thus the content of the publication can no longer be modified and is preserved as the historical version of a released product.

Sharing a baseline

You can share a baseline among different publications. In addition, when you create a new publication, you can use (share) the existing baseline of another publication.

When a baseline is shared among publications, note the following key points:

  • The baseline must contain references to all objects used in every publication.
  • It is not necessary that each publication contains all objects that are referenced in the baseline.

Sharing a baseline should only be done by advanced users. In particular, when sharing a baseline, note the following implications for freezing the baseline:

  • You must freeze the whole baseline and not only the objects that are used in one of the sharing publications. You cannot freeze part of a baseline.
  • Furthermore, freeze a shared baseline only when all objects are to be released for all of the publications sharing the baseline.