A benchmark used as a reference point. In configuration management, a baseline is a snapshot of the state of a service or individual configuration item at a point in time. It enables the comparison of the current state against the recorded state to identify drift or unauthorized changes.
Without baselines, it is impossible to measure improvement or detect regression. You cannot know if a change was successful or if a security breach has occurred (via file integrity monitoring) if you do not know what "normal" looks like.
In the world of Sovereign Engineering, baselines must be automated. We prefer Infrastructure as Code (IaC) as the ultimate baseline. If the live system drifts from the git repository, it is wrong. We don't just measure baselines; we enforce them programmatically.