managing agile software development projects

UNIVERSITY OF ZAGREB

FACULTY OF ORGANIZATION AND INFORMATICS

VARAŽDIN

MANAGING AGILE SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT

PROJECTS: BEST PRACTICES AND PROJECT

MANAGEMENT TOOLS

MASTER THESIS

Mentor:

Ph.D. Ruben Picek, assistant professor

Student:

Martina Šimičić

ID Number: 38805/09-R

Information and Software Engineering

Graduate Study

Varaždin, Rujan 2011.

Contents

1. Introduction

2. Project management

3. Software development methodologies 1. Traditional

2. Agile 1. Extreme programming

2. Scrum

4. Tools for Agile Software Development

5. Analysis of Agile software development projects 1. POS project

2. Invoicing project

3. Educational software project

6. Conclusion

7. Literature

Introduction

The fastest and the most efficient way of

developing software?

Deliver software on budget, on time,

satisfy customer, allocate resources?

Traditional or Agile Methodology?

Project management tool?

Project management

Project team

Executive sponsor

Project Director

Steering Committee

Customers

Stakeholders

Key Stakeholders Vendors

Software development

methodologies

According to Sommerville [ (5), page 13]

there are three key challenges facing

software engineering nowadays:

The heterogeneity challenge

The delivery challenge

The trust challenge

(5) Sommerville, Ian. Software engineering - 8th edition. s.l. : Addison Wesley, June 4, 2006.

Software development

methodologies - Traditional

According to Awad [ (7), page 6] there are

four main characteristics of heavyweight

methodologies:

Predictive approach

Comprehensive documentation

Process oriented

Tool oriented

(7) Awad, Mohamed. Comparison between Agile and Traditional Software Development

Methodologies. [Online] [Cited: 25 February 2011.]

http://pds10.egloos.com/pds/200808/13/85/A_comparision_between_Agile_and_Traditional_SW

_development_methodologies.pdf.

Software development

methodologies - Agile

Agile methodologies are introduced by four

basic values [ (10)]:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive

documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

(10) Agile values. Agile manifesto official web page. [Online] [Cited: 2 March 2011.]

http://agilemanifesto.org/.

Software development

methodologies - Agile Agile process

Modularity

Iterative

Time-Bound

Parsimony

Adaptive Incremental

Convergent

People-Oriented

Collaborative

Granville, Miller G. The Characteristics of Agile Software Processes. [Online] [Cited: 2 March 2011.]

http://faculty.salisbury.edu/~xswang/Research/Papers/SERelated/Agile/12510385.pdf.

Extreme programming - XP

Values

Principles

Best practices

Extreme programming - XP

Roles

On-site customers

Product Owner

Domain experts

Business analysts

Technical specialists

Interactions designers

Programmers

Designer and

architects

Testers

Stakeholders

Coaches

Extreme programming - XP

Concepts and best practices:

Test Driven Development

Refactoring

Timeboxing

The Last Responsible Moment

Technical Debt

Stories

Iterations

Velocity

Theory of Constraints

Mindfulness

Scrum

Values and principles

Empiricism

Emergence

Timeboxing

Prioritization

Self-organization

Scrum

Roles

Product Owner

Scrum Master

Project team

Smaller teams

For bigger - Scrum

of Scrums

(17) Waters, Kelly. Using Scrum on Larger Projects: "Scrum of Scrums". [Online] [Cited: 22

February 2011.] http://www.allaboutagile.com/using-scrum-on-larger-projects-scrum-of-

scrums/.

Scrum

(18) Eclipse. Eclipse organization. [Online] [Cited: 22 February 2011.]

http://epf.eclipse.org/wikis/scrumpt/Scrum/guidances/supportingmaterials/resources/ScrumLarge

Labelled.png

Tools for Agile Software

Development

PivotalTracker Team Foundation Server VersionOne

The Exia Process Acunote BrixHQ

Target Process Mingle BannanaScrum

Tools for Agile Software

Development

Evaluation model:

Basic description

Team collaboration and source code

management

Tool configuration

Reporting and documentation

Specific product characteristics

Results

Analysis of Agile software

development projects – POS project

4 persons project team + 1

Desktop application

Visual Basic

Visual Studio Team Foundation Server

Analysis of Agile software

development projects – POS project

Question 1:

Is it possible for the Product Owner to

be a Scrum Master at the same time?

Analysis of Agile software

development projects – POS project

Question 2:

What does the one story point

actually indicate?

Analysis of Agile software

development projects – POS project

Question 3:

Is it possible to add user stories during

the sprint?

Analysis of Agile software

development projects – POS project

Question 4:

What can POS project team do to get

higher results?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

3 persons project team + 1

Web application

Ruby on Rails

DokuWiki, email, TFS

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

Question 5:

Agile methodologies and new

technologies, how does it fit

together?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

Question 6:

Is it possible that a Wiki system

replace an agile project

management tool?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

Question 7:

Is it possible to practice Scrum

without planning poker game and

triangulation?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

Question 8:

How far can the team go in agile

methodology adoption?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Invoicing project

Question 9:

What can Invoice project team do

to get higher results?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Educational software project

5 persons project team

Dislocated team (5h time-zone difference)

Web application

Ruby on Rails

PivotalTracker, DokuWiki

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Educational software project

Question 10:

Is it possible and is it needed to

perform daily meetings in

distributed project teams?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Educational software project

Question 11:

How do the agile methodologies

respond to the needs of distributed

teams?

Analysis of Agile software development

projects – Educational software project

Question 12:

What can Educational software

project team do to get higher

results?

Conclusion

When starting agile, a methodology

should be chosen and all of the concepts

should be adopted

Coach, project management tool and wiki

system are desirable

Team communication is essential

Best tool

Future work…

Agile documentation

Managing distributed systems

Transaction of knowledge between senior

and junior programmers

http://agile-only.com/

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