Agile Development Methodologies

Question 1

Waterfall Criticisms - Pros

Answer 1

• Detailed specification of requirements.
• Precise plan and road-map.
• Controlled and prescriptive.
• Defined start and end points.
• Clear demarcation at each phase.

Question 2

Waterfall Criticisms - Cons

Answer 2

• Users rarely know all the requirement up front.
• Limited visibility of product until last stage.
• Inflexible, difficult to change direction of requirements.
• Much effort and planning needed before starting.
• Created distance between developer and user.

Question 3

Agile manifesto

Answer 3

• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
• Responding to change over following a plan

Question 4

Agile Objectives

Answer 4

• Continuous innovation
• Improved time-to-market
• People and process adaptability
• Product adaptability
• Reliable results

Question 5

Agile Principles

Answer 5

1. Customer satisfaction by rapid delivery of useful software
2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development
3. Working software is delivered frequently (weeks)
4. Working software is the principal measure of progress.
5. Sustainable development, able to maintain a constant pace
6. Close, daily cooperation between business people and developers.
7. Face-to-face conversation is the best form of communication
8. Projects are built around motivated individuals, who should be trusted.
9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design
10. Simplicity
11. Self-organizing teams
12. Regular adaptation to changing circumstances

Question 6

Traditional project/Agile trade off

Answer 6

Traditional:

Cost /\
/ \
/___\
Time Scope

Agile:

Value/\
/ \
/___\
Quality Constraints

Question 7

What are the agile trade off goals?

Answer 7

Value goal: build a releasable product
Quality goal: build a reliable adaptable product
Constraint goal: achieve value and quality goals with acceptable constraints

Question 8

What are the DSDM objectives?

Answer 8

• Right solution
• Right time
• Team & stakeholders remain focused on business outcome
• Early investment returns
• No quality compromise

Question 9

What are the DSDM principles?

Answer 9

• Focues on the business need
• Deliver on time
• Collaborate
• Never compromise quality
• Build incrementally from firm foundations
• Develop iterativiely
• Communicate continuously and clearly
• Demonstrate control

Question 10

MoSCoW rules?

Answer 10

Must have
Should Have
Could have
Would have but won’t this time

Question 11

What are the SCRUM principles?

Answer 11

• Empirical process control: observation and experimentation rather than detailed up-front planing
• Self-organization: workers will deliver greater value when self-organized, resulting in better team buy-in and shared ownership
• Collaboration: project management as a shared value-creation process
• TIme-boxing: time is a limit constraint and must be used to manage project planning and execution
• Iterative development: iteration will deliver products that better satisfy customer needs.

Question 12

What are the roles in traditional development?

Answer 12

• Business analyst: analyses main business aspects of the system and designs the new business processes and policies
• Project manager: lead team member who does planning, reporting, scheduling and staff management and acts as primary point of contact
  for project
• System analyst: identifies how technology can improve business processes and designs new business processes and the new system
• Technical architect: technical expert who design how the various system components fit together to provide a stable working system

Question 13

What are the roles in agile development?

Answer 13

• Developer: key worker in Scrum team, self-organized, no hierarchy, empowered to estimate
• Scrum master: team member who does admin, reporting, coaching, monitor.
• Product owner: customer stakeholder. Prioritizes add details to user stories and make decisions on behalf of the business.

Question 14

What requirements should have user stories?

Answer 14

I.N.V.E.S.T

• Independent: the user should be self-contained.
• Negotiable: Story can be changed
• Estimable: Story must be defined
• Sized: break bigger epics into smaller stories
• Testable: Story must provide necessary information.

Question 15

What are the agile criticisms?

Answer 15

• Can’t sprint forever
• Co-location and distributed development
• Cost can be expensive
• Requires awareness and knowledge of scrum
• Endless development
• Unclear when development should stop
• Unsuited for development of some infrastructure components