Applying Agile Methodology to Manage Web Application Development in Oil and Gas Industry

Transcription

1 St. Cloud State University therepository at St. Cloud State Culminating Projects in Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering Applying Agile Methodology to Manage Web Application Development in Oil and Gas Industry Likith Kumar Battigiri Follow this and additional works at: Recommended Citation Battigiri, Likith Kumar, "Applying Agile Methodology to Manage Web Application Development in Oil and Gas Industry" (2015). Culminating Projects in Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering. Paper 8. This Starred Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering at therepository at St. Cloud State. It has been accepted for inclusion in Culminating Projects in Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering by an authorized administrator of therepository at St. Cloud State. For more information, please contact

2 1 Applying Agile Methodology to Manage Web Application Development in Oil and Gas Industry by Likith Kumar Battigiri A Starred Paper Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of St. Cloud State University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Engineering Management December, 2015 Starred Paper Committee: Ben Baliga, Chairperson Hiral Shah Balasubramanian Kasi

3 2 Abstract The Project is carried out on SCRUM, an agile methodology used for software application development. The project further describes how SCRUM is useful in managing software development. With the increase in complexity of software, functional requirements keep changing throughout the development life cycle. It is very important to select an appropriate software development technique to address these changes; otherwise the entire software project will fail. So, software development techniques evaluation is mandatory to make sure if they fit a given project environment. The main objective of the project was to identify how Scrum methodology can be used in organizations to manage software development projects and also evaluate efficiencies and risks of Scrum methodology at the end of entire software development.

4 3 Acknowledgments I owe a great many thanks to great many people who helped and supported me during the project. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my mentors Dr. Ben Baliga, Dr. Hiral Shah and Prof. Gary Nierengarten for all their support and encouragement at every step throughout my course of study at St. Cloud State University. First and foremost, my deepest thanks to my advisor, Dr. Ben Baliga, the Guide of the project for guiding and supporting me throughout the project. I would also like to express my thanks to Dr. Hiral Shah, Prof. Gary Nierengarten and Dr. Balsy Kasi for their precious time in carefully reviewing my project. I am grateful for their valuable suggestions and comments. Finally, I would like to thank my family and all my friends for constantly encouraging and supporting me in this endeavor. It is with their help that I have successfully completed my Master s Program in Engineering Management.

5 4 Table of Contents Page List of Tables... 6 List of Figures... 7 Chapter I. Introduction... 8 Introduction... 8 Problem Statement... 9 Nature and Significance of the Problem... 9 Objective of the Project Project Questions Limitations of the Project Definition of Terms Summary II. Background and Review of Literature Introduction Background Related to the Problem Literature Related to the Problem Literature Related to the Methodology Summary III. Methodology Introduction... 27

6 5 Chapter Page Design of the Study Data Collection Data Analysis Budget Timeline Summary IV. Data Presentation and Analysis Introduction Data Presentation Data Analysis Summary V. Results, Conclusion and Recommendations Introduction Results Conclusion Recommendations References... 52

7 6 List of Tables Table Page 1. Sociological Context Factors for Web Application Development Project Project-Specific Context Factors for Web Application Development Project Data Tabulation and Percentage Distributions Efficiencies and Risks of Scrum Framework... 46

8 7 List of Figures Figure Page 1. Software Development Life Cycle Phase Crum Framework Product Backlog Graph Sprint Backlog Graph Spring Meeting Planning Graph Spring End Date and Team Deliverable Graph Daily Scrum Meeting Graph Sprint Retrospective Graph Spring Review Graph... 45

9 8 Chapter I: Introduction Introduction Many companies these days follow several project management techniques to efficiently run their projects. It has been a great challenge for several organizations to choose a best project management technique that suits their work environments. Time and cost are the two key factors to be considered for managing projects well. The best project management technique is the one that helps in completing the project in time and also within the estimated budget. Several reasons account to the failure of software development projects. Mismatch of requirements, exceeding time and exceeding budget are some of the generally known reasons for the failure. Besides these, choosing an unsuitable project management technique also leads to the failure of software development projects. A proper project management technique has to be chosen based on the scope of the project, size of the project, organization work environment, time and budget allocated to the project. This helps in keeping the software development project in the right track and also eliminates the risk of failures caused by other factors. Agile methodology is the most widely used project management technique by several organizations for their software development projects. This methodology works great in environments where requirements change rapidly throughout the project scope and has been proven to achieve high project success rate for many organizations. There are several software development techniques within the agile

10 9 methodology. This project describes how Scrum technique of Agile is used to manage development life cycle of a real time software project and evaluates how well it fits in for the project development. Problem Statement Software requirements tend to change throughout the development life cycle. It is very important to have a proper software development technique to address these changes. Selecting an inappropriate software development technique leads to failure of the entire software project. So, software development techniques have to be evaluated if they suit a given project environment. Nature and Significance of the Problem There are several software development techniques described by researchers. Each of these fits different project environments. It is very important to select the right software development technique that suits the organization that we are working for and the project that we are working on. This project identifies whether the project environment that we are working on suits Scrum methodology of Agile and also shows how easily this particular agile methodology can be used at each stage of software development life cycle: requirements gathering, analysis, design, development, testing and deployment. This project can be used as a basic framework that provides guidelines to apply Scrum software development methodology for any other software development projects. In addition to this, a variation of this framework or a hybrid of different project

11 10 management techniques can be used to fit any type of software development projects. Objective of the Project The main objective of the project was to identify how Scrum methodology can be used in organizations to manage software development projects, discuss how Scrum methodology was helpful in identifying any risks in the application development and evaluate how effective was the Scrum methodology at the end of entire software development. Project Questions After successfully accomplishing the project, the following questions were answered based on the results obtained from the project: a) What is the basis for selecting Scrum agile methodology in this project? b) Why Scrum agile methodology is useful in developing a software project? c) What efficiency levels were achieved (in terms of time and budget) at the end of the project? d) What are the factors of Scrum which were helpful in identifying any threats in this project? e) What are the other possible project management techniques that could be applicable to manage the software development project more effectively? Limitations of the Project This project was conducted on a web application development project under specific software development settings which was unmodified throughout the project.

12 11 A single case study was used to conduct the research on. So the following were identified as the limitations of the project: a) This project results cannot be generalized to all kinds of software development projects. b) This project results don t provide external validity, but can be used as a reference to develop software projects that are similar to the one used in this project case study. Definition of Terms The following are the key terms discussed in the project: a) Software development methodology: It is a framework used in software engineering structure, plan, and control the software development process. b) Project management methodologies: These are the techniques used to initiate, plan and execute projects successfully. Specific project management methodologies can be used for different types of industries and projects. c) Agile methodology: It is mainly uses best practices for modeling and documenting software systems. This methodology is more adaptable and flexible than traditional software development methods, making it a better fit in an environment where requirements keep changing at each stage. c) Scrum methodology: It is widely used agile software development technique. It suits a wide range of software development environments. It

13 12 focuses on communication and collaboration, delivering functioning software at short intervals, and adapts to changing software requirements. d) Extreme programming: It is an agile software development methodology which focuses on software development best practices. It emphasizes on applying best development practices to develop the software and provide continuous feedback on the developed functionalities. The customer is also involved throughout the project to provide valuable feedback. f) The Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is the process of developing or modifying software systems by following software development methodologies. People, process and technology play a vital role in success of the software development lifecycle. g) Pair programming is an agile software development technique, where two or more programmers work together on a software development task. One, the driver, develops the code while the other, the observer, reviews the code developed by the driver. The driver and the observer switch roles to achieve better results. h) Best practices are a set of approaches to software development which results in developing most efficient software in a productive manner within the budget. A combination of best practices can be used to best fit a specific software development environment. Different organizations follow different best practices to fit their projects and teams.

14 13 Some of them would be: Iterative development, Test driven development, Quality testing, Requirement change management, Following standard coding practices, Software version control. Project management best practices remind us that if we successfully initiate, plan, execute, monitor, control and close out our projects, our metrics will illustrate better results. Best practices represent the practical application of the concepts, processes, and tools defined in the project. Summary This chapter introduces to the problem that the project tried to solve and evaluate. The nature and significance of the project are discussed. Limitations of this project implementation are also addressed. Important terms and keywords are briefly explained, which are necessary to understand the project. The next chapter discusses the framework and research methodologies used to conduct the project in detail.

15 14 Chapter II: Background and Review of Literature Introduction This chapter will explain the background related to the project and research area where the project is conducted. Literature related to project problem and literature related to methodologies used to conduct the project is discussed in detail. This chapter will provide readers, a complete and broader aspect of the project. Background Related to the Problem Shell Global Solutions (SGB) helps improve its customer s business performance by providing leading-edge energy consulting and innovative technology. The company is committed to give innovative technology solutions and environmentally friendly approaches to its clients. Many cutting-edge technologies have been developed in response to the challenges that emerge when operating complex process plants in demanding operating environments: It develops and supports software solutions that are used in several areas of the energy industry. Following is the list of software products that SGB develops: APPO gives traders the tools they need to keep up with the demanding pace of Oil, energy and commodity trading. VITA is a comprehensive Oil production (COP) tracking and management solution designed to serve entities that need to track and manage COP transactions, keep an up-to-date COP inventory, and maintain compliance with regional oil production tracking systems.

16 15 Tech is a front-to-back-office solution that provides both financial and physical trading throughout North America. PTE allows users to define customized constraints and extend predefined models, optimizing each portfolio individually. The capstone project was conducted on Data Operations team at the company is called SIEP which develops and provides the Web Application, to different products in the company, based on requirements gathered from the clients and other teams of the company. The Web Application development project developed by SIEP team was used as the case study to conduct the capstone project. The application functionalities are implemented using C#.Net, ASP.Net, HTML, CSS, JavaScript using Microsoft Visual Studio. Oracle is used for extracting the data required for the framework using TOAD. This SIEP team uses Team Foundation Server (TFS) A Microsoft visual studio integrated tool for version control. Some software solutions that the company provides to the Engineers that are mentioned in the previous section are built on the framework that SIEP team builds. The Web Application development (SIEP) project uses Scrum methodology for developing the software and this methodology was evaluated as a part of capstone project. Literature Related to the Problem In this section, the concepts related to the project s research area are explained in detail, in order to achieve a clear understanding of the project.

17 16 Software development life cycle. Software development life cycle (SDLC) is a process that involves various phases in developing software. Every phase of the SDLC has its own process and deliverables that are used as input to the next phase. These phases are: requirements gathering, requirements analysis, code design, code development, testing, deployment, maintenance and support [1]. Figure 1, shows the default phases of SDLC and they are explained below in detail. Figure 1: Software Development Life Cycle Phase [2] a) Requirements Gathering/Analysis: This is the first and critical phase of the project. All the expectations from the customer or the management or the team are detailed and documented at this phase. The whole process in this phase is iterative with much communication taking place between stakeholders, end users and the project team.

18 17 b) Design: In the design phase, the technical design requirements are prepared by lead development staff which may include architects and lead developers. c) Development: This phase is the actual implementation of the design using code. This is normally the longest phase of the SDLC. The finished product here is input to the Testing phase. d) Testing: Once the coding is done, all the code is migrated to the test environment where different kinds of testing will be done. After the successful completion of the testing phase and if code looks good to be on the whole system, it is sent to deployment. e) Deployment/Maintenance: The Deployment phase of the project is where; all the code that s been written and tested is delivered and installed to the end user/customer system or deployed on to the server. Different types of software development methodologies. Software engineering researchers have provided several software development methodologies that fit for various industry software solutions. Following are some of the software development methodologies: Waterfall (also known as Traditional) Incremental Development Spiral Development Prototyping Methodology Agile Methodologies

19 18 Rapid Application Development Joint Application Development Traditionally for several years most of the organizations have been using Waterfall approach for their software development processes. Waterfall approach is a linear, sequential and structured software development model which suits best for small-sized projects where all requirements and specifications of the project are known beforehand. Any changes in the project requirements cannot be incorporated in projects that follow Waterfall approach. Consequently the projects fail. To overcome these problems, organizations have tried to adopt agile software development methodologies that are highly embrace changes throughout the development process [1]. Agile methodology is an iterative and incremental approach of software development. There are several agile software development methodologies such as Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Lean and Kanban development, Crystal, Feature-Driven Development (FDD) and Dynamics Systems Development Method (DSDM) [1]. Among these agile methodologies, Scrum and XP are the most widely used development techniques. Different types of Agile methodologies. Following are the different types of Agile methodologies with their framework description. a) Scrum: Scrum is a lightweight methodology which can be applied for controlling and maintaining all kinds of incremental and iterative projects. Scrum focus to produce working software functionalities in short intervals

20 19 of about 4 weeks [1], [4]. It is highly iterative and incremental [1], [4]; focuses on developing high priority software functionalities and organizes development team well to promote communication between customers, functional lead, project manager and development team [1], [4]. Scrum is the most popular software development methodology in the software community due to its proven flexibility, adaptability, productivity and simplicity. In Scrum, the "Product Owner" works closely with the functional and technical teams to identify and prioritize system/software functionality in the form of a "Product Backlog". The Product Backlog comprises of features, bug fixes, non-functional requirements, etc. [1]. The team works on the Backlog and keeps delivering the outcomes in a specific set of time frames. b) Lean and Kanban software development. Lean Software Development focuses on delivering valuable and efficient product to the customer. Following are the important principles of Lean framework [1]: 1. Eliminating Waste 2. Amplifying Learning 3. Deciding as Late as Possible 4. Delivering as Fast as Possible 5. Empowering the Team 6. Building Integrity In 7. Seeing the Whole

21 20 The following are the three main principles of Kanban [1]: Visualize the workflow Limit the amount of work in progress (WIP) Enhance the work flow b) Extreme Programming (XP). XP focuses on delivering high-quality software quickly and continuously, where the customer works closely with the development team [1] providing feedback on the software. The main principles of XP are Simplicity Communication Feedback Courage d) Crystal. The Crystal methodology is one amongst the adaptable and lightweight agile software development methodology. Crystal has several variations: Crystal Orange, Crystal Yellow, Crystal Clear etc., whose distinct characters would be several factors such as project priorities, system criticality and team size [1]. e) Dynamic Systems Development Method (DSDM). In DSDM, requirements are gathered during the beginning of the project at a high level and these are prioritized using MoSCoW Rules [1]: M Must have requirements S Should have if at all possible

22 21 C Could have but not critical W Won t have this time, but potentially later f) Feature-Driven Development (FDD). The development process in FDD is built using the following eight practices [1]: 1. Domain Object Modeling 2. Developing by Feature 3. Component/Class Ownership 4. Feature Teams 5. Inspections 6. Configuration Management 7. Regular Builds 8. Visibility of progress and results. Literature Related to the Methodology To implement this project, a real time Web Application for a specific customer will be developed using agile methodology with Scrum. This Web Application development project will be used the case study to evaluate Scrum methodology. Web application development using Agile methodology with SCRUM. The following will be the different steps to develop the Web Application project using Agile methodology with scrum. Figure 2, shows the different events/phases involved in Scrum framework:

23 22 Figure 2: Scrum Framework [5] [1] Software development project assignment and roles identification. Initially the Web Application development project will be assigned to a specific team within the company. Then the project manager of that particular team will be responsible for managing the project. The project manager follows the scrum methodologies to manage the project and assigns various roles such as team lead, business analysts, developers and testers to the team members.

24 23 b) Initial project planning. An initial meeting will be conducted to discuss and plan [4] various development life cycle stages of the project with all the team members, Scrum Master and Product Owner [6]. c) Sprint tasks identification. At this stage, Scrum Master and Product Owner will be involved with the development team to assign what functionalities to be assigned and developed at the end of each 30 days of sprint timeline [1]. During this 30 days sprint timeline, a daily scrum meeting about 15 to 30 minutes takes place between all the members who are involved in the project to track the updates, progress and problems in the development process. For each sprint the following steps (d) through (i) are iterated for each incremental development of the software [7]. d) Requirements gathering. This is the first stage of software development life cycle for each sprint timeline. The functional lead and the business analysts gather the requirements from the customer to develop the required Web Application. e) Requirements analysis. Once the requirements are gathered, the functional lead, business analysts, project manager and development team will meet to check whether the customer specifications to develop the application could be developed within estimated time and then the project manager assigns tasks to the development team. Various software, hardware and tools that will be required to develop the software will be

25 24 identified; manage and track the progress of the Web Application development. f) Code design. The team leader along with his development team members chooses the best design and good software development practices to incorporate the object oriented software development. The team will be using Microsoft Visio or Rational Rose software to design the code. Web application layout prototype will be designed using HTML, XML and Microsoft Visual Studio. Each member of the team will be assigned specific functionality of the web application development and certain estimated time will be allotted to develop the part of the Web Application. g) Code development. During this phase of web application development, developers of the team follow best software development practices embraced by the company to develop most efficient and high performance software. Either pair programming or individual programming is followed among the team members to develop code for the web application. Team members also use Team Foundation Server (TFS) version control system which allows parallel development of the web application by the team members and also keeps track of code changes made by all the team members. h) Code testing Peer code reviews, manual testing, automated testing tools are performed by both developers and testers to test whether developed functionality of the Web Application works as per the customer

26 25 requirements. Generally, development and testing is done parallel in order to eliminate delayed code errors, bugs and functionality mismatch. i) Deployment and maintenance. As per the customer requirement, once the basic functionalities of the web application are developed, the web application software is deployed and the web application goes live so that it can be the actually used by the end users of the web application. If there are any errors or bugs while using the web application, these are reported to developers/testers. The assigned developers and testers take the responsibility to solve the issues. Once high priority issues are solved, software releases are made to effect the changes made to the web application [8]. Scrum meetings are conducted daily for each 30 days sprint timeline throughout the web application development life cycle discussed in the above steps. For each scrum timeline all the steps from (d) through (i) are iterated [8] to develop web application functionalities and each scrum is considered as an incremental development of the web application functionalities [6]. If the customers requirements changes at any stage of the web application development, those could be easily incorporated in the development life cycle at the beginning of each sprint [1]. Project manager tries to manage and track all these activities to make sure the web application development progresses smoothly on time and as per requirements [1].

27 26 Summary This chapter provided in depth explanation of concepts related to the project problem and methodology. The next chapter will discuss the methodology used to conduct the project research in detail.

28 27 Chapter III: Methodology Introduction This chapter discusses the methodology used to conduct the project. The most suitable research method was applied to the project. The reasons behind selecting this research method are explained. The framework applied to the project and data collection processes are discussed in detail. Various tools and technologies used to analyze the data collected are also discussed. The budget and timeline involved to conduct this entire project are also specified. Design of the Study The main objective of the project was to analyze how the Scum agile methodology was used to manage software development projects and evaluate the efficiency of the Scrum methodology. This project also aimed to gain in-depth understanding of the Scrum methodology, advantages and disadvantages of using this methodology in a given project scenario. A real time web application development project was used as a case study to conduct the research on. A team consisting of six developers and one team lead developer worked on this web application development project which was managed by a project manager using basic Scrum methodology. Necessary observations and evaluations were made from the application of Scrum methodology to this specific web application development project. A qualitative approach was chosen to conduct the project. It helps in gathering the primary information to understand and evaluate the efficiency of Scrum methodology, based on data gathering strategies that involve individual interviews

29 28 conducted on the team members involved in the web application development project. This kind of research approach is most suitable for this project, as it is subjective in nature. This helps in understanding the efficiency of Scrum methodology based on each member s opinion of the development team, including the project manager. Obtaining opinions, observations and suggestions from development experience of each member of the development team is very valuable to explore the broad, complete and detailed description of Scrum methodology used in the case study. This kind of research strategy provides a whole picture of Scrum methodology usage, efficiency and productivity. The subjective nature of the case study was useful in gathering the verbal data from the development team, which was analyzed to interpret the Scrum methodology application to the web application development project and provide a tailored methodology that fits the project. Data Collection Data was collected from the development team using qualitative data gathering strategy. Personal interviews were conducted for each member involved in the development team to gather the data. Two set of personal interviews were designed: primary and secondary. Primary interviews were semi-structured interviews and involved open-ended questions to explore the Scrum methodology theory and its usage in project development and management. Primary interviews were conducted during the development phase of the web application development project. Secondary interviews were conducted to clarify and refine the problems

30 29 identified from the primary interviews. Secondary interviews were conducted at the end of development phase of the web application development project. The questions asked in the primary and secondary personal interviews, were related to the tasks and phases involved in the Scrum methodology. Several questions were framed to cover the entire concept of Scrum methodology. These questions were focused on how each individual task and phase of Scrum methodology affects the efficiency and productivity of web application development project. The primary interviews helped in identifying the base benefits and issues involved in Scrum methodology within the development team to develop the project. The secondary interviews helped in diagnosing those identified issues with Scrum methodology and come up with a better tailored Scrum methodology by adopting better tasks and phases from other agile methodologies. Data Analysis The qualitative verbal data collected form the development team via personal primary and secondary interviews was analyzed by quantifying that data using pie charts and graphs. These pie charts and graphs provided a visual representation of the responses and helped in identifying the key areas of Scrum methodology that had to be focused to improve the web application development efficiency and managing the development project in a better way. Budget No budget was involved to conduct this project. Research was primarily based on personal interviews conducted within the development team. So the exploratory

31 30 nature of the project made the research, data collection and analysis very simple to evaluate the Scrum methodology and accomplish the project objectives. Timeline The following is the timeline to complete this project: Project Idea Formulation and Research... August 2014 Project Proposal Write-up... September 2014 Gathering the requirements... June 2015 Analyzing the requirements... June 2015 Designing the code... July 2015 Developing the code... July 2015 Testing the developed code... August 2015 Deploying the tested code... August 2015 Evaluating the Agile Methodology... August 2015 Project Write-up... September-October 2015 Final Defense... October 2015 Summary This chapter introduced how the project was conducted using a qualitative research methodology, on what basis data was collected from the development team and how this qualitative data was analyzed to evaluate the efficiency of the Scrum methodology. Budget involved in conducting this project is also discussed and timeline taken to accomplish this project was also mentioned.

32 31 Chapter IV: Data Presentation and Analysis Introduction This chapter will discuss how data was collected from the development team members and presents the data collected in detail which makes the analysis of the data easier. Data presentation provides a clear understanding of the data collected. Data analysis techniques are also discussed in detail. Data analysis was used to identify and evaluate the efficiencies and risks of Scrum methodology. Data Presentation The case study used to conduct research on, was a Web Application development project. There are certain factors of this case study project that were unmodified until its completion. These factors are: Sociological factors [6] and Project-specific factors [8]. Sociological factors are the size of the team, development/work experience level of each member of the team, domain expertize of each member of the team, programming language expertise of each member of the team and project management expertise of the project manager. Project-specific factors are the functional requirements (new functionalities/modifications to existing functionalities) specified by the customer to develop, domain of the development, relative complexity of the development effort, approximate lines of code. The Sociological and Project-Specific factors of the Web Application development project used in the case study are listed in Table 1 and Table 2. Under these specific factors, Scrum methodology was evaluated for the web application development case study by assessing each and every event, phase and component

33 32 of basic default Scrum framework. This evaluation is based on a developer s perspective of software development of the project used in the case study. Table 1: Sociological Context Factors for Web Application Development Project Sociological Context Factor Team Size (No. of developers) Value 5 (4 developers, 1 Team Lead) Team Education Level 3 Masters Level, 2 Bachelors level Team Experience Level 0-5 Years Domain Expertise Medium to High Language Expertise Moderate Project management Expertise High Table 2: Project-Specific Context Factors for Web Application Development Project Project Specific Context Factor Value New and Changed User Specifications 187 Domain SIEP (Web Application Support and development) Relative Complexity Medium to High LOEC (Lines of Executable Code) 15

34 33 The research assessment factors used to evaluate the Scrum framework are: Product Backlog, Sprint planning meeting, Sprint Backlog, Sprint end date and Team deliverable, Burn down/up Charts, Daily Scrum Meeting, Sprint Review and Sprint Retrospective. Scrum product backlog. The agile product backlog in Scrum is a prioritized features list, containing short descriptions of all functionality desired in the product. When applying Scrum, it's not necessary to start a project with a lengthy, upfront effort to document all requirements. Typically, a Scrum team and its product owner begin by writing down everything they can think of for agile backlog prioritization. This agile product backlog is almost always more than enough for a first sprint. The Scrum product backlog is then allowed to grow and change as more is learned about the product and its customers [9]. A typical Scrum backlog comprises the following different types of items: 1. Features 2. Bugs 3. Technical work 4. Knowledge acquisition Sprint planning meeting. In Scrum, the sprint planning meeting is attended by the product owner, Scrum Master and the entire Scrum team. During the sprint planning meeting, the product owner describes the highest priority features to the team [9]. The team asks enough questions that they can turn a high-level user story of the product backlog into the more detailed tasks of the sprint backlog [9].

35 34 Sprint backlog. The sprint backlog is a list of tasks identified by the Scrum team to be completed during the Scrum sprint. During the sprint planning meeting, the team selects some number of product backlog items, usually in the form of user stories, and identifies the tasks necessary to complete each user story. Most teams also estimate how many hours each task will take someone on the team to complete [9]. It is critical that the team selects the items and size of the sprint backlog. Because they are the people committing to completing the tasks, they must be the people to choose what they are committing to during the Scrum sprint [9]. The sprint backlog is commonly maintained as a spreadsheet, but it is also possible to use your defect tracking system or any of a number of software products designed specifically for Scrum or agile [9]. Daily Scrum meeting. In Scrum, on each day of a sprint, the team holds a daily scrum meeting called the "daily scrum. Meetings are typically held in the same location and at the same time each day. Ideally, a daily scrum meeting is held in the morning, as it helps set the context for the coming day's work. These scrum meetings are strictly time-boxed to 15 minutes. This keeps the discussion brisk but relevant. All team members are required to attend scrum meetings. Since both the Scrum Master and product owner are committed team members, they are expected to attend and participate. Anyone else (for example, a departmental VP, a salesperson or a developer from another project) is allowed to attend, but is there only to listen. This makes scrum meetings an excellent way for a Scrum team to

36 35 disseminate information- if you're interested in hearing where things are at, attend that day's meeting [9]. The daily scrum meeting is not used as a problem-solving or issue resolution meeting. Issues that are raised are taken offline and usually dealt with by the relevant subgroup immediately after the meeting [9]. Sprint review. In Scrum, each sprint is required to deliver a potentially shippable product increment. This means that at the end of each sprint, the team has produced a coded, tested and usable piece of software. So at the end of each sprint, a sprint review meeting is held. During this meeting, the Scrum team shows what they accomplished during the sprint. Typically this takes the form of a demo of the new features. The sprint review meeting is intentionally kept very informal, typically with rules forbidding the use of PowerPoint slides and allowing no more than two hours of preparation time for the meeting. A sprint review meeting should not become a distraction or significant detour for the team; rather, it should be a natural result of the sprint. Participants in the sprint review typically include the product owner, the Scrum team, the Scrum Master, management, customers and developers from other projects. During the sprint review, the project is assessed against the sprint goal determined during the sprint planning meeting. Ideally, the team has completed each

37 36 product backlog item brought into the sprint, but it's more important that they achieve the overall goal of the sprint [9]. Sprint retrospective. No matter how good a Scrum team is, there is always opportunity to improve. Although a good Scrum team will be constantly looking for improvement opportunities, the team should set aside a brief, dedicated period at the end of each sprint to deliberately reflect on how they are doing and to find ways to improve. This occurs during the sprint retrospective. The sprint retrospective is usually the last thing done in a sprint. Many teams will do it immediately after the sprint review. The entire team, including both the Scrum Master and the product owner should participate. You can schedule a scrum retrospective for up to an hour, which is usually quite sufficient. However, occasionally a hot topic will arise or a team conflict will escalate and the retrospective could take significantly longer. Although there are many ways to conduct an agile sprint retrospective, our recommendation is to conduct it as a start-stop-continue meeting. This is perhaps the simplest, but often the most effective way to conduct a retrospective. Using this approach each team member is asked to identify specific things that the team should: Start doing Stop doing Continue doing There are many variations on this simple format. The Scrum Master can facilitate this sprint retrospective meeting by asking everyone to just shout out ideas

38 37 during the scrum. The Scrum Master can go around the room asking each person to identify any one thing to start, stop or continue. Or, for example, he or she can tell everyone to focus on identifying something to stop this time because not much attention has been paid to things to stop in recent retrospectives. After an initial list of ideas has been brainstormed, teams will commonly vote on specific items to focus on during the coming sprint. At the end of the sprint, the next retrospective is often begun by reviewing the list of things selected for attention in the prior sprint retrospective [9]. The primary and secondary personal interviews were conducted on a semistructured interview basis. The evaluation assessment questions were prepared beforehand to simplify the interview process and avoid a complete open-end discussion. During the primary personal interviews, each member of the development team were asked to assess each research assessment factor by asking them to choose one of the most suitable ordinal values [8]: {strongly helpful, helpful, improvable, difficult and not-workable}. These ordinal values were corresponded to following numerical values to present/quantify the data collected: strongly helpful-5, helpful-4, improvable-3, difficult-2 and not-workable-1. After the completion of primary personal interviews, all the team members were asked to think of any possible suggestions to tailor the basic default Scrum framework to fit the Web Application development project. During the secondary personal interviews, each member of the team was asked to provide those valuable

39 38 and improvable suggestions to incorporate into the basic default Scrum framework and tailor it to fit the developed project. Data Analysis Based on the primary personal interviews, following were the percentage distributions of the ratings for each phase given by the team members are listed in Table 3 and efficiencies and risks specified by them for each phase are listed in Table 4. Table 3: Data Tabulation and Percentage Distributions Stage Product Backlog Sprint Meeting Planning Total Members Sprint Backlog Sprint End Date & Team Deliverable Burn down/up Charts Daily Scrum Meeting Sprint Review Sprint Retrospective Rating Percentage (%) Rating 5: 80 Rating 4: 20 Rating 5: 100 Rating 5: 80 Rating 4: 20 Rating 5: 20 Rating 4: 60 Rating 3: 20 Rating 1: 100 Rating 5: 60 Rating 4: 20 Rating 3: 20 Rating 5: 20 Rating 4: 40 Rating 3: 40 Rating 1: 100 Graphs are drawn by using the data from rating given by each developer about the particular phase in the Scrum methodology. The variation in response

40 39 given by every developer can be clearly observed. The usefulness of each phase was measured from the graphs. Figure 3: Product Backlog Graph Figure 3, clearly shows how likely the team members are satisfied about the product backlog phase in Scrum Methodology. Every scrum methodology maintains a product backlog as it leads to successful software product development.

41 40 Figure 4: Sprint Backlog Graph Almost all the team members gave positive ratings for the Sprint backlog phase of scrum methodology. Figure 4 depicts that all the members of the team are satisfied about this phase.

42 41 Figure 5: Sprint Meeting Planning Graph Figure 5, shows all the team members are highly satisfied about the Sprint Meeting Planning phase in Scrum Methodology. Sprint Meeting Planning plays a crucial role in a software development project.

43 42 Figure 6: Sprint End Date and Team Deliverable Graph The Sprint End Date and Team Deliverable have got mixed ratings from the team members. Figure 6, shows that the team members are moderately impressed by Sprint End Date and Team Deliverable phase in Scrum methodology.

44 43 Figure 7: Daily Scrum Meeting Graph Figure 7 describes that Daily Scrum Meeting phase is partially encouraged by the team members. However, Daily Scrum Meeting is very essential for a successful software development project.

45 44 Figure 8: Sprint Retrospective Graph The team members gave least ratings for Sprint Retrospective stage of Scrum Methodology. Figure 8 shows how less likely the members are satisfied about the Sprint Retrospective phase.

46 45 Figure 9: Sprint Review Graph In General, Most of the projects do not want to follow this phase of the Scrum Methodology as it deals with the things that are already taken care in the project. From Figure 9 it is concluded that the team members are less likely to adopt this phase in their project development technique.

47 46 Table 4: Efficiencies and Risks of Scrum Framework Stage/Practice Overall Assessment Product Backlog (Strongly Useful) Sprint Planning (Strongly Useful) Sprint Backlog. (Strongly Useful) Sprint end date and Team deliverable (Moderately Useful) Burn down/up Charts (Not-Workable) Daily Scrum Meeting (Strongly Useful) Sprint Review (Moderately Useful) Sprint Retrospective (Not-Workable) Efficiencies Keep the developers in loop about what things need to be done Useful to set a specific goal for every time frame. Very essential to plan the entire development. Help in prioritizing the development tasks. List of tasks assigned to everyone is distinguished. Once tasks are created, it gives an idea to which developer it has to be assigned. These do not usually change. Having these planned will keep the project in track and keep the team motivated. This feature is not utilized. This would be helpful to keep track of time and progress. Keeps everyone updated on others tasks and any possible red flags. Most of the stuff is usually covered in the sprint meetings. Useful to track back if something is wrong. Usually everything is covered in weekly meetings. Same objectives will be already covered by Sprint meetings phase. Risks None. Some project details may be missed during this phase. Improper planning will lead to failure in successive phases and tasks. Improper task assignment will lead to waste of time and budget extension If the customer comes up with immediate requirement, then it has to fixed using a patch None. Communication gap between US development team and international development team. No daily scrum meetings between these two teams May consume much time. None.

48 47 Summary This chapter presented the data collected form the development team and analyzed the data collected from them. After analysis, efficiencies and risks of Scrum methodology were identified. The team also came up with suggestions to improve the Scrum methodology by adding new phases and tasks to the Scrum framework. The next chapter will discuss in detail the results of this project research and come up with future work recommendations.

49 48 Chapter V: Results, Conclusion and Recommendations Introduction This chapter will discuss the results of the Scrum methodology evaluation assessed on a case study of web application development project. The answers for all the project questions will be provided. Conclusions and recommendations will also be discussed based on the results obtained from the evaluation. Results This project evaluated Scrum methodology on a Web Application development project which was used as a case study. The efficiencies and risks of the Scrum framework were explored. The qualitative data collected and analyzed showed that Scrum fits well within the case study project. All the tasks and phases of Scrum that were implemented by the case study project were very helpful. If those were incorporated, then there would been much improvement in the web application development process. The following are the questions identified during the initial stage of capstone project research. The answers for these questions are addressed below: Q) What is the basis for selecting Scrum agile methodology in this project? A. Scrum agile methodology was selected on the basis of its shorter development life cycles; Scrum best fits for a project development team of four- five.

50 49 Q) Why Scrum agile methodology is useful in developing a software project? A. Scrum methodology was very adaptable in this project. There were situations where the functional requirements would change or some modifications had to be re-implemented like deleting the existing code and adding the new lines of code. The adaptability, flexibility and iterative nature of Scrum made these changes very easy. Q) What efficiency levels were achieved (in terms of time and budget) at the end of the project? A. After the implementation of the Scrum methodology in this project, many road-blocks in the project were eliminated because of the Daily Scrum meetings. In these scrum meetings, we were able to see what s working and what s not periodically and this helped us to save project time. Also, it saved a lot of money as the size and cost of the development team is very low. Q) What are the factors of Scrum which were helpful in identifying any threats in this project? A. Threats were easily resolved at the initial stages of this project using scrum methodology. Product Backlog, Sprint Planning Meetings and Daily Scrum Meetings are the main assessment factors in identifying the threats in this project development.