WELDING METHOD

A welding method materially cohesively bonding at least two components using at least one additive material. A welding seam is produced with a seam course between a seam start and a seam end. The process is controlled using at least one control unit, at least one external physical welding seam property of the welding seam is influenced by a control parameter of the control unit, and information is included in the control parameter. The information, during the process is stored in the welding seam between a start point and an end point in the seam course using the at least one external physical welding seam property so that the information can be read, optically and/or haptically, from a sequence of the at least one detectable external physical welding seam property along the course of the seam in the region between the start point and the end point.