RE: Practice: Weekly Cycle

> -----Original Message-----
> From: William Wake 
> [mailto:william.wake-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: 25 November 2004 01:28
> To: xpbookdiscussiongroup-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [xpe2e] Practice: Weekly Cycle
>
>
>
> All -
> When you have two-week iterations, I'm curious what that means:
>
> - do you have twice as many stories "in process"?
> - is your typical story unable to be completed in a single week?
> - or is a story the "usual" :) size, but you have "wait time" within it?
> - do you tie releases to the iteration length at all?
> - ... (the other 20 reasons I'm not clever enough to make up here)
>

In our case, we typically have around 5 stories per iteration, with the
stories estimated at being between 2 and 5 days to complete.

We always produce a labelled release at the end of an iteration (whilst
still having un labelled daily builds).

Coupling this with only having manual acceptance tests, it leaves us with
little time in a weekly iteration.

What we have seen is that when we have 'many smaller' stories per iteration,
rather than the usual 'few larger', we are more likely to finish them within
the iteration. I can almost guarantee that the 5 day estimated stories are
worked upon right up to the last minute before release, and usually there's
some code smells left untreated.

Currently there's some discussion within the team of whether we should have
a refactoring iteration to address these code smells. As the coach I'm
trying to show how we can address these issues without resorting to this.


> In Brad's case,

snipped

>
> I've used a variety of iteration lengths. I've noticed that teams
> almost always want to push for longer rather than shorter, but rarely
> for reasons I've particularly liked. (Like some of you, I have on
> occasion gone with the team's consensus.) Of course, I have the same
> challenge about how much testing to do and lots of other stuff as
> well.

I agree, I've seen our team perform better when the stories are smaller.
Better in terms of the story estimates are more accurate, stories actually
be completed on time, the Stories are more in line with what the customer
actually wanted - due to quicker better feedback. Obviously, this effects
our velocity as well. Also, the team's sense of accomplishment increases
when we achieve more stories per iteration.

But, despite all of this, as a whole the team finds it hard to break stories
down into smaller stories. Some members still question the 'value' of
breaking a story down.

Our lack of automated acceptance tests means it would be very difficult to
use a weekly iteration. Yet weirdly I think it may actually be a catalyst
for improving development as a team if we did attempt weekly iterations

Andrew



------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> 
$9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything.
http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/nhFolB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->