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| Agile: 1.3 Introduction to Agile | IndianTechnoEra |
What is Agile?
Agile is a project management methodology that breaks down larger projects into smaller, manageable chunks known as iterations. At the end of every iteration (which typically takes places over a consistent time interval), something of value is produced. The product that’s produced during every iteration should be able to be placed into the world to receive feedback from stakeholders or users.
Contrary to Waterfall project management, agile is strictly sequenced: you do not commence design until research is complete and development doesn’t commence until all designs are signed off. With agile, developers, designers, and business people are simultaneously working together.
Key Agile Concepts
User Stories:
In consultation with the customer or product owner, the team divides up the work to be done into functional increments called “user stories.” Each user story is expected to yield a contribution to the value of the overall product.
Daily Meeting:
Each day at the same time, the team meets so as to bring everyone up to date on the information that is vital for coordination: each team members briefly describes any “completed” contributions and any obstacles that stand in their way.
Personas:
When the project calls for it – for instance when user experience is a major factor in project outcomes – the team crafts detailed, synthetic biographies of fictitious users of the future product: these are called “personas.”
Team: A “team” in the Agile sense is a small group of people, assigned to the same project or effort, nearly all of them on a full-time basis. A small minority of team members may be part-time contributors, or may have competing responsibilities.
Incremental Development:
Nearly all Agile teams favor an incremental development strategy; in an Agile context, this means that each successive version of the product is usable, and each builds upon the previous version by adding user-visible functionality.
Iterative Development:
Agile projects are iterative insofar as they intentionally allow for “repeating” software development activities, and for potentially “revisiting” the same work products.
Milestone Retrospective:
Once a project has been underway for some time, or at the end of the project, all of the team’s permanent members (not just the developers) invests from one to three days in a detailed analysis of the project’s significant events. (see more)