New directions on agile methods: a comparative analysis

Abrahamsson, Pekka; Warsta, Juhani; Siponen, Mikko T.; Ronkainen, Jussi

doi:10.1109/icse.2003.1201204

Cited by 445 publications

(368 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…In 2003 Abrahamson et al found 'a jungle of emerged software development methods', and a lack of empirical evidence to support ideas [8]. In 2008, Dingsøyr et al [9], stated that the primary challenge for agile research was to combine academic rigour with industrial relevance, suggesting that researchers could use research methods such as action research as a way to increase relevance and impact.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

The challenges that challenge: Engaging with agile practitioners’ concerns

Gregory

Barroca

Sharp

et al. 2016

Information and Software Technology

106

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Context: There continues to be concern that research is not addressing the challenges that practice faces. For the benefit of academia and industry, researchers need to be aware of practitioners' challenges and their context so that relevant and applicable research is undertaken.Objective: This paper investigates two research questions: what challenges do agile practitioners face?and, how do practitioner challenges manifest themselves in an organisational setting? It aims to map the practitioner challenge landscape, explore challenge characteristics, compare findings with previous literature and identify implications for research that is relevant to practice.Method: A combination of methods was used: elicitation of practitioner challenges collected using a Challenge Wall at a series of practitioner events; organisational Case Study using interviews, document analysis and observation; and online Survey. Findings were then compared to previous publications. Results:Challenges collected from the Challenge Wall were grouped under 27 subthemes and seven themes: Claims and Limitations, Organisation, Sustainability, Culture, Teams, Scale, and Value.Investigating one challenge in the Case Study uncovered a set of new challenges, which were interrelated. Over 50% of survey respondents experienced challenges highlighted in the Case Study. Conclusion:The landscape of agile practitioner challenges is complex and intertwined. Some challenges, such as doing agile in a non-agile environment, are multi-dimensional, affect many aspects of practice, and may be experienced simultaneously as business, organisational, social and adaptation problems. Some challenges, such as understanding cultural change or measuring agile value, persist and are hard to address, while others, such as adoption, change focus over time. Some challenges, such as governance and contracts, are under-researched, while others, such as business and IT transformation, have been researched but findings have not had the expected impact. Researchers wishing to address practitioner challenges need to treat them in context rather than in isolation and improve knowledge transfer.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

The challenges that challenge: Engaging with agile practitioners’ concerns

Gregory

Barroca

Sharp

et al. 2016

Information and Software Technology

106

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“…Scrum is one of the agile development software development processes [1] where the focal aspects are simplicity and speed [9]. It progresses via a series of iterations called sprints, typically 2 -4 weeks long.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Focus on Usability in Testing Practices in Industry

Lárusdóttir

Bjarnadottir

Gulliksen

2010

IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology

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Abstract.A study exploring the focus on usability in testing practices in software development teams in Iceland using the agile software process Scrum is described in this paper. A survey was conducted to describe how testing is conducted and to what extent testing techniques are used. The results show that unit, integration, system and acceptance testing are the most frequent testing techniques used, but usability testing is not that common. Neither are alpha, beta, performance/load and security testing. Interviews were conducted to exemplify how practitioners conduct usability testing and what they describe as the difference of usability and acceptance testing. Some examples from the interviews show that practitioners are willing to do formal usability testing on extensive parts of the system, but because the iterations in Scrum are short and the changes to the system in each iteration are small, formal usability testing does not fit into the project work.

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“…On one hand, there are a couple of dissenting texts which describe agile methods, and XP in particular, as irrational and vague (McBreen 2003;Stephens and Rosenberg 2003). In addition, quite a few also highlight the fact that some agile method practices are nonprescriptive, and represent a high level of abstraction, lending themselves to inconsistent interpretation and implementation (Abrahamsson et al 2002;Boehm and Turner 2004;Koch 2005). On the other hand, however, there is at least one proprietary text to accompany every agile method, with an entire series of texts dedicated to XP.…”

Section: Clarity and Rationale Behind Practicesmentioning

confidence: 99%