XP customer practices: A grounded theory

The Customer is a critical role in XP, but almost all XP practices are presented for developers by developers. While XP calls for Real Customer Involvement, it does not explain what XP Customers should do, nor how they should do it. Using Grounded Theory, we discovered eight customer practices used by successful XP teams: Customer Boot Camp, Customer’s Apprentice, Customer Pairing, and Programmer’s Holiday support the well-being and effectiveness of customers; Programmer On-site and Road shows support team and organization interactions; and Big Picture Up Front and Re-calibration support Customers steering the whole project. By adopting these processes, XP Customers and teams can work faster and more sustainably

An Empirical Study Of Software Quality Improvement Practices From Multiple Perspectives – An Australian Case Study

The literature on software quality research to date has shown a lack of empirical insight into the use of methods for achieving quality in a real context. Further investigation is required if we want to increase our understanding on how to improve software quality practices. In particular, we wanted to explore the key factors which impact software improvement practices in a case study, by studying the perspectives of three key stakeholders - developers, managers and customers. The selected exemplary case is a small Australian based software company with exceptional record in terms of organizational growth and performance. A qualitative approach was adopted to conduct this exploratory study. Results were analyzed using the Grounded Theory approach to develop an initial framework from the empirical data. We hope that this framework will provide a deeper understanding of the reasons and perceptions for the use of quality methods in practice, and thus have an impact on both researchers and practitioners

Success of Agile Environment in Complex Projects

This paper discusses the impact of agile methodology in complex and modular interrelated projects based on the authors’ practical experience and observations. With the advancement of Web technologies and complex computer systems, business applications are able to transcend boundaries in order to fully meet business requirements and comply with the legislation, policies and procedures. The success of software development as well as software deployment of these complex applications is dependent upon the employed methodology and project management. This is so because employed methodology plays an important position in capturing and modeling of business requirements and project management helps to ensure delivery. Agile methods are rapidly becoming popular in the software development industry. This paper examines this crucial role of agile methodology in a software development and deployment environment