linaro-project-management team mailing list archive

[Victoria Janicki <vicky.janicki@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey Joey,

A good summary of where we seem to be - which is in the exploration/pilot stage.

Just wanted to elaborate on a couple of points that you made:

What is Agile Software Development?
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 methodologies that have gathered Agile common processes together such as Scrum. Kanban also is considered an Agile methodology though it has distinct differences from Scrum.

So it is quite reasonable and common to pull together a set of Agile practices that best suits an organization or team. We will most likely find that different teams may have a different set of practices. For example, the Landing Teams may find a Kanban approach fits better than a strict Scrum approach.

I am looking forward to hearing the feedback from the pilots. I think it may be reasonable to use the August Sprint as a deadline for any decisions.
 
Vicky Janicki
vicky.janicki@xxxxxxxxxx
Program Director, Member Services
Linaro
Tel:      +1.978.319.1661
mailto: vicky.janicki@xxxxxxxxxx
IRC: vicky Skype: vjanicki 




On May 17, 2011, at 2:19 PM, Joey Stanford wrote:

> Hi Gang,
> 
> There is a bit of uneasiness and confusion surrounding the move to
> monthly releases so I thought I'd offer up some commentary.  Part of
> the cause of this anxiety is due to a general desire to explore the
> Agile methodology and best practices and see if what we could adopt
> inside Linaro.
> 
> So that we're on the same page, here's what relatively certain today:
> 
> 1) Working Groups will be making a monthly source code release.
> 
> Please socialize this within your teams and begin to think about how
> you want to accomplish this.  The finer details have not yet been set
> but Kiko has some ideas which will be appearing during the TL calls.
> Note that this is a source code release only.
> 
> To help you frame this mentally, here is the current mock-up of the
> download page that Kiko and I have been playing with:
> http://www.linaro.org/remote/downloads/
> 
> Our release manager(s) will be generating the schedule for these over
> the next few weeks and more work is being done behind the scenes so
> stay tuned.
> 
> 2) The project management team will be piloting some Agile-based ideas
> 
> * The Landing Teams will be piloting SCRUM lead by Anmar with help from Vicky.
> * Mounir is looking at some changes for his WGs and he'll be in touch
> with the affected TL's to discuss the ideas (if not already).
> * Vicky and myself, with some help from James W and the PMs, are
> looking at the viability of a Kanban system integrated into
> status.linaro.org
> * The PM team is reviewing other tools such as LeanKitKanban and
> IceScrum among others.
> * Illias is looking at a broad range of things for OCTO and Graphics
> and will be in touch (if not already) with those affected to discuss
> ideas.
> 
> If you, as a Team Lead, want to move faster or do any sort of pilot on
> your own, DO IT. :-)   These are pilots and not edicts.  Discuss these
> items in your teams so long as they don't detract from getting your
> WI's completed. As a general rule we should always be on the look out
> for enhancements.
> 
> 
> 3) Monthly releases != Agile
> 
> Please don't confuse these two items.  Yes, moving to a monthly source
> code release definitely lends itself to applying Agile practices, and
> yes, we want to foster/encourage this.  Because we are still thinking
> through the relationships and the practices I don't have any immediate
> guidance for you beyond what's above.  At some point though we'll
> settle on what looks like the best ideas and formalize them.  I'm
> hopeful that we'll be driving these improvements via the release
> process and release manager but they will take some time. We don't
> want to rush into anything yet we also do not want to drag our feet
> until November.   Since a mass training will likely not be done due to
> cost, we have to look for easily driven, high value avenues.
> 
> 
> Joey