A very long engagement

®

IBM Software Group

© 2009 IBM CorporationInnovation for a smarter planet

A Very Long Engagement

Rational DOORS one year on.Seb Rose

http://www.ibm.com/software/rational

http://www.ibm.com/software/rational

IBM Software Group | Rational software

Innovation for a smarter planet

The journey continues

The Rational DOORS team is working to adopt a more agile development methodology

IBM is very supportive of the idea of agileQSE acts as an ‘Improvement Community’ hub

Still a challenge agile is new, different, and poorly understood within large sectors of IBM



A Very Long Engagement

A book by Sebastien Japrisot

Adapted in a film starring Audrey Tautou

Brief synopsisMathildes fiancée goes off to war (WW1)

He is sentenced to death by the military and is thrown into no-mans land

Mathilde refuses to believe he is dead

She continues to search for him, despite contracting polio

… uncovering corruption in the French government

… and eventually finds him decades later.

Adopting agile methods within IBM is taking longer than expectedThe next 5 slides describe where we had got to 12 months ago when I

last reported at XPDay


Innovation for a smarter planet4

Consensus is not always easy to reach (2009)

Usage of RTC (& agile process definition)Are 4 week iterations too long?

How do we schedule technical tasks not directly relating to user story?

Should there be a separate test task for each implementation task?

Usage of DOORS within development processHow to integrate with RTC

Traceability from designs to tasks to change logs

Division of responsibilities between test & developmentIs a formal handover needed each iteration?

Who tests what (and when)?

How to coordinate allocation of resources from separate teams

Changing development practicesNew approach controversial (interfaces, small classes, dependency injection)

Validity of unit test approach questioned



Improve our build environment (2009)

Implement separate (continuous) integration builds

Complete rollout of Buildforge

Simplify multiple platform client build

More reliable integration of automated unit tests

Engage with operations group to integrate server environment with our process



Automate regression test backlog (2009)

Test resources have been allocated

Automate our manual tests scripts

Expand DXL API as required

Run tests from RQM

Make regression tests available to developers



Continue improving development process (2009)

Dependency breaking is still biggest hurdleSimplify architecture

Reduce re-build times

Facilitate unit testing

Ensure legacy code modifications are unit tested

Solve cross platform issues with unit test framework

Encourage adoption of test-first approach (TDD)

Drive development of future features with “customer” tests



Feedback methods need to be developed further(2009)

Identify and collect relevant metrics

Standardize user story sizing to stabilize velocity

Better use of retrospectives to improve process

Future projects would benefit from more “customer” involvementPrioritisation

Acceptance test design

Regular reviewing of nightly builds



Where are we now…

The FVT test personnel are part of the development team

We have a Development (Project) Manager, but no ‘scrum’ master

There is still a degree of scepticism about agile within the teamWe are not self organizing

Limited use of TDD

Stories are too bigThe tasks they are implemented by are too big

Stakeholders are not sufficiently engaged

Downstream teams support requests from favoured clients

Project approval process tends toward over commitment



Still to be addressed…

Team trust

Process management

Stakeholder engagement

Agile practicesTDD

Metrics

Retrospectives

Automated acceptance tests



Conclusions?

Organisations are hard to changeEven when it looks like they want to change

Change happens slowlyOne step at a time

Celebrate small successes

Maintaining morale is crucialBoth your own & other people’s

“Patience is a virtue, but I don’t have the time” – Talking Heads, Psycho Killer



Technology

A very long engagement