Exploring agile processes
Karen Anewalt · Journal of computing sciences in colleges · 2012
Agile software processes are becoming more pervasive in industry settings; however these same processes have not been widely adopted in academic settings. A common thread among agile software processes is the iterative approach to the software lifecycle. It can be challenging to integrate a pure agile process in a typical software projects course due to the time constraints of a semester, but integrating elements of the agile approach can be useful from both an instructor and student perspective. This tutorial will introduce the participants to the key principles of the agile software process which proclaims to value: • Individuals and interactions over processes and tools. • Working software over comprehensive documentation. • Customer collaboration over contract negotiation. • Responding to change over following a plan. There are many flavors of agile processes and this tutorial will focus the Scrum model. Examples of how Scrum can be used to organize a classroom software development project will be discussed. Several open source tools that can be useful in supporting agile software projects from the requirements gathering phase through development and testing will be demonstrated. Participants will engage in a participatory game to illustrate some of the main components of the agile software process model. Attendees will leave this tutorial with ideas for integrating agile approaches into their own software projects courses.