A software development team must manage changes to source code for different clients who utilize...

A branch is the best option because it allows a development team to maintain separate lines of development from a shared codebase. In CompTIA Cloud+ (CV0-004) objectives related to DevOps practices, version control, and configuration management, branching strategies are used to support multiple feature sets, releases, and customer-specific customizations without disrupting the primary (main) code line. For example, a team can create a branch per client, per release version, or per feature set, enabling isolated development and testing while still inheriting common fixes and improvements from the main branch when appropriate. This is especially useful when different customers require different configurations or optional modules in the same product.

A commit is simply a recorded change to code within a branch; it doesn’t provide separation for different client versions by itself. A push sends committed changes to a remote repository but also doesn’t address parallel code management. A merge combines branches back together, which is often done after changes are validated, but it is not the mechanism for maintaining separate client-specific variations. Therefore, branching best meets the requirement.