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Infrastructure Refactoring

Early implementations of Agile focused on brand new or newer product-lines. More recently, Agile is gaining acceptance in the legacy product space where the project teams are moving away from their company's traditional (aka, waterfall) methodology and moving toward an Agile approach. In these cases, the project team that begins to use Agile methods are typically inheriting an existing infrastructure that was constructed for a phased (aka, waterfall) approach.

Mario  Moreira's picture Mario Moreira
Iterations

Iteration is at the heart of agile development practices. In an agile project you do something, measure your progress, and then use the feedback from the measurement to figure out what to do next. This cycle allows you to follow the Agile Manifesto value Responding to change over following a plan by providing for points in time where you can measure your progress at the project level. Whether your approach to agile is project-focused like Scrum or development-focused, like extreme programming, iteration is what drives an agile project.

TechWell Contributor's picture TechWell Contributor
Social Network Analysis within Agile Teams

It is possible to apply techniques borrowed from social network analysis) to software development teams. Once revealed, social networks can be actively or passively stimulated for the benefit of team formation and cohesion. Agile principles incorporate social network stimulation on an almost subliminal level; this is one of the reasons why agile principles work.

TechWell Contributor's picture TechWell Contributor
Silver Bullets, Theory, and Agility

Software isn't hard, thinking is hard!

"The essence of a software entity is a construct of interlocking concepts ... I believe the hard part of building software to be the specification, design, and testing of this conceptual construct ..."

Frederick P. Brooks Jr.

Brooks suggests that the creation of a conceptual construct is the "irreducible essence" of software. Four properties contribute to the difficulty of creating such a construct: complexity, conformity, changeability, and invisibility.

TechWell Contributor's picture TechWell Contributor
Writing Shippable Code (Part Two)

The first part of this article introduced the concept that developing a complex software system was like going on a journey. I contrasted how we plan our journeys through the use of route planning systems against that of an agile journey which is more like using a GPS in our car. I also introduced the idea that we only know when we have reached our journeys end (being completely done) when we have demonstrated that we have fully satisfied the expectations of the customer, our criteria for a successful outcome and that we can use this thinking throughout our project so that each iteration delivers software which can achieve a successful customer outcome.

TechWell Contributor's picture TechWell Contributor
Transitioning to Agile in the Middle of a Project

Every team transitions to agile in different ways, and this column is one of those stories. But what makes this one different is that the main character, a project manager, is transitioning her team to agile in the middle of a project. From this story, Johanna Rothman details a potential survival guide for any project manager and team embarking on the same journey.

Johanna Rothman's picture Johanna Rothman
Seven Agile Coach Failure Modes

Agile Coaches have a big job.

"Support the team but not too much and not too little."

"Be available but don't be overbearing."

"Offer ideas but don't get too involved."

"Coach, don't manage."

All this advice can be confusing, even contradictory. No wonder Agile Coaches fall into less-than-desirable behaviors as they try out new things to help teams. The problem is that these behaviors can subtly undermine a team's ability to organize, improve and, eventually, reach high-performance. That's why they are called failure modes.

Lyssa Adkins's picture Lyssa Adkins
The New Challenge in Agile Adoption

The good news is: Agile is going mainstream; it is not some fad nor is it just for unwashed coders. Managers get it. The not so good news is: this means the approach to introducing Agile needs to change.

Agile Software Development started at the code face. Kent Beck's original Extreme Programming had little - if anything - to say about the wider organization and the role of management. Developers could - and did - just adopt practices like test driven development and stand-up meetings.

Allan Kelly's picture Allan Kelly
Think Like a Tester

After more than thirty years in information technology, the last fourteen spent focused on testing and quality assurance, Dale Perry has come to believe everyone can benefit from thinking like a tester. In this article, Dale offers comical, yet serious, insight on how a tester views airport bathroom stall designs.

Dale Perry's picture Dale Perry
From The Editor

I wish there was a book entitled "How to Write Your First Letter as an Editor", unfortunately there is none that I am aware of, so please bear with me. As the new Editor-in-Chief of the Agile Journal, I would like to introduce myself and tell you a little about where we will be going with the Agile Journal over the next few months.

TechWell Contributor's picture TechWell Contributor

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