All things you need to know about Agile development

Agile! You may have heard of it or read about it on a daily walk. It is all over the internet, workplace, and LinkedIn, for someone who isn’t tech-ish enough this may seem obscure. So, let’s have a quick walk through the commotion on Agile software development.

At the end of this blog, you will have a clear understanding on: 

1. What is agile and its functions?
2. How agile is different from every other development methodology?
3. The pros and cons of agile development, and 
4. What are the agile frameworks?

What is Agile?

The first step to learn about agile is to understand why it exists in the first place. Let’s dig up some history and look into the concept called the “Waterfall development methodology”.

The Waterfall model is the first-ever process model to be used in the software development life cycle. 

It is better known as the “linear-sequential life cycle model”. The whole development process in the waterfall model is classified into different phases, where the outcome of phase one is the input of phase 2 and so on…

This model was successful, simple, and effective. Until few major issues started occurring, Namely-

1. You will have to wait till the almost end of the life cycle to see the working software.
2. If the clients cannot see the model until the near completion, there is no time for feedback reception or changes until the late cycle, which implies lots of risk and uncertainty.
3. Again, when there is risk involved, the damage is done to time and money.
4. The process itself is lengthy. Imagine having to finish an extensive project with this process. The futility is already sensed. 

The agile methodology was founded to rectify the above issues and create a better interactive development process. The Agile software development cycle has six major steps: concept, inception, iteration/construction, release, production, and retirement.

Concept: 

Business opportunities are identified and prioritized.

Inception:

Team members are identified, the fundings are planned, and initial environments and requirements are discussed.

Iteration/Construction:

The development team starts working to deliver the project based on iteration requirements and feedback.

A timeline that outlines the various responsibilities of the team and the work to be completed for each sprint is created. A sprint is a period during which specific work has to be completed and made ready for review.

Release:

In this step, the final QA testing takes place along with internal and external training, documentation development, and the final release of the iteration into production.

Production:

This phase emphasizes the ongoing support of the software.

Retirement:

Marks the end-of-life activities, such as notifying customers and final Migration.

With quick comparison, we can see that agile software development is a well-planned establishment that leads to the complete out ruling of the project failure issue. 

The time and resources are well managed. The client feedback and issues are taken into account and resolved immediately. Now, as the concept of agile is explained, let’s explore the types of agile methodologies/frameworks.

Types of agile software development methodologies/Frameworks:

Scrum:

Scrum is a highly determined agile method that consists of a set of complex development principles. 

In scrum, product backlogs are created. These backlogs are lists of things that need to be taken into account, and they help the team identify and prioritize the product entities. 

The backlogs consist of bug fixes, features, and non-functional requirements. The team members will then distribute a software program in increments called the sprint. 

Upon completion of a sprint, product backlogs are checked and priorities are moved with each cycle.

Lean Software Development: 

Lean software development is a set of 7 principles that promotes less programming effort, budgeting, and defect rates by one-third when applied in a software development process.

The following are the principles of the lean model:

• Waste Elimination
• Amplifying Learning
• Late Decision Making
• Fast Delivery
• Team Empowerment
• Built-in Integrity
• View Applications as a Whole

The lean model promotes fast feedback and issue resolution. It diminishes the communication gap between the programmers and the clients. 

To accomplish this, it provides individuals and small teams with decision-making authority instead of relying on a control hierarchy. 

To ensure less wastage, the lean model asks the users to only select useful features for their system. These features are marked priority and delivered in batches.

Extreme Programming (XP): 

Extreme programming methodology is another agile software development framework used to make high-quality software. 

This framework works better for a small and dynamic work environment where the developers and the clients can meet up regularly. 

It has a set of five values – communication, simplicity, feedback, courage, and respect. 

• Communication is the key for any software development, effective communication results in efficient products. XP encourages face-to-face discussion with the aid of a whiteboard or other drawing mechanism.
• Simplicity – This value promotes simpler products or designs for efficient make and support.
• Feedback – Constant feedback helps the programmers revise and perform the requirements with more success rate. Hence feedback is definitely appreciated in all agile software development methodologies.
• Courage and Respect are the soft skills the team needs to create a successful working environment. Courage to speak up when something is not right, and respect to create harmony in the working teams.  Again, this method is effective for a small and dynamic team, who can have real-time meetings and brainstorm at regular intervals.

Kanban: 

Kanban is more visual when compared to other agile development methods above. Kanban is more goer and getter and doesn’t slack at any point in the development process. 

They run in 4 primary principles, namely –

• Start with what you do now.
• Agree to pursue incremental, evolutionary change.
• Respect the current process, roles & responsibilities.
• Encourage acts of leadership at all levels.

David Anderson, the author of “Kanban – Successful Evolutionary Change for your Technology Business” states six properties that result in successful kanban execution, which are-

• Visualize the workflow.
• Limit the work in progress.
• Manage flow.
• Make process policies explicit.
• Implement feedback loops.
• Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally.

How to choose the right agile software development framework?

Now that we have come to the end of our agile talk. Let’s talk about choosing the one for your business.

There is no clear route to the right agile methodology. It all depends on the nature of the development project and your objective. 

All agile methods practice – effective communication, transparent progress, and timely delivery. 

Never choose an agile method and revolve your team around it. Always choose the method that better suits the nature of your team and your clients.

All agile methods have their own pros and cons. On the whole, the major con of an agile methodology is limited resource planning and less documentation which could be changed by powerful management and planning.

Communicate with your team and your client to choose the best fit for your project. 

After all, communication is “the secret mantra” in any environment.

Happy agile-ing!