SPEAKER

Jim Highsmith Cutter Consortium

Jim Highsmith is director the Cutter Consortium's Agile Project Management Practice and author of Agile Software Development Ecosystem (Addison Wesley 2002) and Adaptive Software Development: A Collaborative Approach to Managing Complex Systems (Dorset House 2000) which won the prestigious Jolt award for product excellence.

Jim has 20-plus years experience as a consultant, software developer, manager, and writer. He has published dozens of articles in major industry publications , including "Does Agility Work", Software Development June 2002; "The Agile Manifesto"; co-authored with Martin Fowler, Software Development August 2001; "Agile Software Development: The Business of Innovation", and "The People Factor"; co-authored with Alistair Cockburn, IEEE Computer September and November 2001.

In the last dozen years, Jim has worked with IT organizations and software companies in the US, Europe, Canada, South Africa, Australia, Japan, India, and New Zealand to help them adapt to the accelerated pace of develop

Agile Software Development - Why Is It Hot?
Tuesday 09:30 - 10:30 (Conference Hall)

Agile Software Development - Why Is It Hot?"

This session will delve into the history, principles, practices, and successes of Agile Software Development. The session begins by answering two key questions: What problems do Agile approaches best solve? And, What are the key distinguishing characteristics of Agile approaches?

In the past two years, a wide range of publications - Software Development, IEEE Software, IEEE Computer, CIO Magazine, Cutter IT Journal, Software Testing and Quality Engineering, and even the Economist - have published articles on Agile Software Development. Conferences such as OOPSLA, XP2002, and Software Development (in the US and Australia) have been highlighting Agile talks, tutorials, and panels. Is this extreme interest a fad, or not? Although recently publicized, many of these approaches have been used successfully for nearly a decade. The main players are: Extreme Programming, Scrum, Crystal Methods, Adaptive Software Development, Feature-Driven Development, Lean Development, and Dynamic Systems Development Methodology. Furthermore, scores of organizations have developed their own "lighter" approach to building software.

Agile ecosystems are broader than the word methodology indicates as they encompass a chaordic perspective, collaborative values, and a barely sufficient methodology. The interest in them is growing for two main reasons: first, they better address the exploratory problem domain characterized by high-speed, high-change, and high-risk; and, second, the social culture and principles of Agile development appeal to many developers and managers.

- Agile Software Development

Agile Methodologies -- Overview and Case Studies I
Tuesday 14:00 - 15:00 (Tutorial Room)

This Tutorial provides detail about Agile Methodologies (or my preferred term - Ecosystems), and in particular, provides an in-dept look at Agile development case studies from around the world and a review of each of the Agile approaches. The Agile Ecosystems covered will be?Extreme Programming, Scrum, Adaptive Software Development, Feature-Driven Development, Lean Development, Crystal Methods, and Dynamic Systems Development Methodology. Although these approaches vary considerably, there are a number of common practices, as well as principles, that will be covered, including: defining customer value, planning iterative cycles, assuring adequate customer contact, using change-tolerant practices, assuring technical excellence, and facilitating team collaboration.

The final part of the session covers how teams should design an Agile Methodology suitable to their needs, create templates for different project types, customize a specific template to an individual project, and then adapt the process based on actual use. We will explore how practices from several Agile approaches can be combined. For example, companies have combined XP and Scrum, and XP and Adaptive Software Development.

- Agile Review Cases

Agile Methodologies -- Overview and Case Studies II
Tuesday 15:30 - 16:15 (Tutorial Room)