Agile is not competing with Waterfall

Fragile is the evil twin of Agile. It is far worse than Waterfall. It's chaotic! Managers feel out of control, they say "I don't like this! I have no idea what the developers are wasting time on". Nothing gets finished, nothing is tested, and nothing at all gets delivered. There is not even the illusion of progress that you get with Waterfall.
via blog.new-bamboo.co.uk

Great post about adopting Agile over Waterfall. Agile isn't an overnight thing. It's a process of continual adoption.

Filed Under // Agile

Posted on 8th of January, 2010

The Problem With Planning

Rather than a detailed plan, I prefer to see a strong vision, a strategy, goals, and a roadmap (high level outline plan). The tactics to achieve this, for example the precise features and all the tasks to deliver them, can vary along the way and are best not articulated up-front. This enables the team to discover the details when they are in a better position to do so, and allows them to change direction rapidly in response to changing circumstances.
via agilesoftwaredevelopment.com

Just read this article on the problem with software planning. I think this paragraph really hits the nail on the head regarding the benefit of flexibility in an agile software development environment.

Filed Under // Agile

Posted on 4th of October, 2009

Snippets #44

  1. Knowledge sharing iii: automation and wiki pages - New Bamboo share their practices on keeping documentation to a minimum.
  2. Security vulnerability in nginx: patch and upgrades available - Important news on the latest release of the HTTP server.
  3. Hiding parts of a view while in development - Excellent little snippet of code to hide parts of a view.
  4. The 7 Software Development Wastes - Lean Series Part 6: Delays - Looking at common delays in projects and how to avoid them.
My Snippets posts are taking a break for the next couple of weeks while I take a break to relax. Don't worry though as my Snippets posts will return at the start of October. See you all then!

Filed Under // Agile Rails Snippets Software Projects

Posted on 15th of September, 2009

Snippets #35

  1. Rails Metal Example #7: Tracking Analysis - Charles Max Wood highlights how Rails Metal can be used to track page impressions across your site. Nice!
  2. High Voltage - Thoughtbot introduce a nice little Rails engine for handling static pages. Might seem a bit overkill for some people who prefer their own solution.
  3. The 7 Software Development Wastes - Jack Milunsky has started a new series of posts on software development wastes identified within Lean. This is part 1 from a couple of weeks ago on partially done work, but be sure to read the rest of the series (parts 2, 3 and 4).

Filed Under // Agile Rails Snippets

Posted on 13th of August, 2009

Snippets #16

  1. Mac-friendly Autotest - A better performing Autotest gem which doesn’t hog resources from your Mac.
  2. Stories - A story and user acceptance test library for the Contest framework. If BDD is your thing, then this might be worth a look.
  3. Hammock - A Rails plugin for eliminating code in a RESTful manner. Looks like a great way to get skinny controllers.

Filed Under // Agile Plugins Rails Snippets Testing

Posted on 28th of May, 2009

Snippets #7

  1. RailsBridge - A new area of the Rails community where aspiring developers like myself can get help and guidance.  This looks to be an exciting and promising part of the community.  Sarah Allen also talks about it in more depth on her the evolving ultrasaurus blog.
  2. Contracts for Agile Software Development - While not Ruby specific, there are lots of Ruby developers working with agile practices and standard.
  3. Rails BDD with Macros, I18n,… with Remarkable - A short look at the testing framework for Rails.

Filed Under // Agile Rails Snippets Testing

Posted on 5th of May, 2009