Comparative Study on Agile software development methodologies

Today-s business environment is very much dynamic, and organisations are constantly changing their software requirements to adjust with new environment. They also demand for fast delivery of software products as well as for accepting changing requirements. In this aspect, traditional plan-driven developments fail to meet up these requirements. Though traditional software development methodologies, such as life cycle-based structured and object oriented approaches, continue to dominate the systems development few decades and much research has done in traditional methodologies, Agile software development brings its own set of novel challenges that must be addressed to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of the valuable software. It is a set of software development methods based on iterative and incremental development process, where requirements and development evolve through collaboration between self-organizing, cross-functional teams that allows rapid delivery of high quality software to meet customer needs and also accommodate changes in the requirements. In this paper, we significantly identify and describe the major factors, that Agile development approach improves software development process to meet the rapid changing business environments. We also provide a brief comparison of agile development methodologies with traditional systems development methodologies, and discuss current state of adopting agile methodologies. We speculate that from the need to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of the valuable software, Agile software development is emerged as an alternative to traditional plan-based software development methods. The purpose of this paper, is to provide an in-depth understanding, the major benefits of agile development approach to software development industry, as well as provide a comparison study report of ASDM over TSDM.Comment: 25 pages, 25 images, 86 references used, with authors biographie

Is agile project management applicable to construction?

This paper briefly summarises the evolution of Agile Project Management (APM) and differentiates it from lean and agile production and ‘leagile’ construction. The significant benefits being realized through employment of APM within the information systems industry are stated. The characteristics of APM are explored, including: philosophy, organizational attitudes and practices, planning, execution and control and learning. Finally, APM is subjectively assessed as to its potential contribution to the pre-design, design and construction phases. In conclusion, it is assessed that APM offers considerable potential for application in predesign and design but that there are significant hurdles to its adoption in the actual construction phase. Should these be overcome, APM offers benefits well beyond any individual project

Bridging the gap between research and agile practice: an evolutionary model

There is wide acceptance in the software engineering field that industry and research can gain significantly from each other and there have been several initiatives to encourage collaboration between the two. However there are some often-quoted challenges in this kind of collaboration. For example, that the timescales of research and practice are incompatible, that research is not seen as relevant for practice, and that research demands a different kind of rigour than practice supports. These are complex challenges that are not always easy to overcome. Since the beginning of 2013 we have been using an approach designed to address some of these challenges and to bridge the gap between research and practice, specifically in the agile software development arena. So far we have collaborated successfully with three partners and have investigated three practitioner-driven challenges with agile. The model of collaboration that we adopted has evolved with the lessons learned in the first two collaborations and been modified for the third. In this paper we introduce the collaboration model, discuss how it addresses the collaboration challenges between research and practice and how it has evolved, and describe the lessons learned from our experience

Toward a Metric Catalog for Large-Scale Agile Development

Nowadays, organizations use agile software development to remain competitive in their frequently changing business environment. Inspired by the success of agile methods on a small scale, organizations have started to apply them in larger contexts. However, the limited scalability of agile methods is a problem. Metrics can be a success factor for achieving agility at scale, thus adopting them is promising. Most scaling agile frameworks provide few recommendations regarding metrics. Likewise, research on metrics in large-scale agile development lacks concrete guidance for metrics or their organization-specific adoption. To fill this gap, we propose two artifacts. We present the design of a minimalistic metric management fact sheet (MMFS) for large-scale agile development to support practitioners in using metrics in their organization-specific development environment. Furthermore, the MMFS is the basis for our metric catalog documenting 196 metrics identified in an expert study to provide a comprehensive metric set for scaling agile environments

Examination of Adoption Theory on the DevOps Practice of Continuous Delivery

Many organizations have difficulty adopting advanced software development practices. Some software development project managers in large organizations are not aligned with the relationship between performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions, as moderated by experience, with intent to adopt the DevOps practice of continuous delivery. The purpose of this study was to examine the statistical relationships between the independent variablesâperformance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions, as moderated by experienceâand the dependent variable of behavioral intent to adopt a continuous delivery system. Venkatesh, Morris, Davis, and Davis\u27s unified theory of acceptance and use of technology provided the theoretical framework. A stepwise multiple linear regression analysis was performed on survey data from 85 technical project managers affiliated with LinkedIn project management groups. The analysis reflected that only performance expectancy was significant in predicting intent to adopt continuous delivery. The findings may contribute to social change by providing project managers with the information they need to support organizational change, collaboration, and facilitation. The knowledge gained may additionally help organizations develop operational efficiency, competitive advantage, and generate higher value to their clients and society

An Exploration of Agile Scaling Frameworks: Scaled Agile Framework (Safe), Large-Scale Scrum (Less), and Disciplined Agile Delivery (DAD)

Aim: The purpose of this research paper is to analyse and compare three widely known scaling frameworks of agile based on the scale: SAFe, LeSS, and DAD. It aims to contribute to the acquisition of a deep and broad knowledge about their foundations, their techniques and applications, their potential, their limitations and, finally, their application through examples. Method: The research strategy will include the following: The use of literature, industry, and case study research related to the three agile scaling frameworks. Secondary data and information were obtained from journals, books, articles, and professional practitioners besides conducting interviews with practitioners and industry experts. Coding and theme identification approaches were also used to analyse the qualitative data that was collected. Results: The actual work of the study includes the description of each framework, outlining the main principles, practices, and distinctive features of each model. This shows that even though SAFe, LeSS, and DAD are based on some specific agile principles, they are still characterized by certain differences in terms of values, approaches, scope of application, and optimal applications in organizational settings. The paper discusses the two frameworks in detail – their key features and applications – and summarizes their comparative strengths and weaknesses for use in various organizational settings. Conclusion: The research findings can be summarized as follows: The selection of the appropriate framework depends on the consideration of factors like size of the organization, culture, complexity of projects, and specific requirements. The paper can be considered as a good source of ideas and practical suggestions for organizations that plan to choose and adopt an appropriate agile scaling framework