C O MPAR ISO N STU DY BETW EEN AGILEFA N T AN D X PLAN N ER PLU S
Professor Daniel AmyotRu i ju n Fa n 6 4 7 2 4 6 2Bad r A l sub a i h i 6 2 0 8 0 7 0
Submitted to Professor Daniel Amyot in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the course CSI 5112 (Software Engineering)
Outline
Business ContextStudy PlanHigh Impact Criteria Low Impact CriteriaResultsConclusion
Introduction about Agile Methods
"Agile" is an umbrella term used to describe a variety of methods that encourage continual realignment of development goals with the needs and expectations of the customer.
Agile Methods are a reaction to traditional ways of developing software.
Agile Methods are actually a collection of different techniques (or practices) that share the same values and basic principles.
Business Context
Software Development Company.Main Business: Insourcing Projects ( two to
six month long projects).Number of Employees: 2 teams (4 developers) and
a Projects Manager.Development Technique: Incremental Development
Methods (Agile). The purpose of this study:
Select an Agile management tool that fits our company’s needs from the head manager to all employs.
Study Plan
Minimal Requirements:The two selected tools must meet these criteria to be under evaluation.
High Impact Criteria:It is out of ten and reflects the need of this criterion in our company.
Low Impact Criteria:It is out of five and reflects how much this criterion can improve and facilitate our work.
Minimal Requirements
Cost: As a small company, open source and free Agile tools has the highest priority.
Compatible Running Environment: Operating System: Windows 7. Database: to be designed in MySQL.
Active Life Cycle: By looking at previous releases and how much
improvements have been done in between.
Minimal Requirements
Criteria\Tool
IceScrum Agilefant Agilo Xplanner+
Cost Free(5)
Free(5)
$1500/year(2)
Free(5)
Platform HSQL(3)
Windows + MYSQL
(5)
Web-based(4)
Windows + MYSQL(5)
Life Cycle Active(4)
Active(4)
Active(5)
Active(4)
Scores 12 14 11 14
Agilefant and Xplanner plus
Agilefant It is developed by Software Business
and Engineering Institute (SoberIT) at Helsinki University of Technology. System Requirements:
OS: (tested on Windows, Apple OS and Linux) Java (Sun jdk 1.5, 1.6,) Application server: Tomcat 5.5, 6.0, or 7.0 RAM at least 512M for Tomcat. Database: MySQL 5. Browser: (Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome).
• Many problems on Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Score (9)
Xplanner-plus It is commonly used and based on
Xplanner, which had a large user base and was the primary tool on the market. System Requirements:
OS: (tested on Linux and Windows). Java (Sun jdk 1.5, 1.6, openjdk 6). Application server: Tomcat 5.5, 6.0; jetty 5. RAM at least 512M for Tomcat. Database: HSQLDB, MySQL. Browser: Any.
Score (10)
High Impact Criteria: Usability
Agilefant1. Ease of Installation: (3 hours)
1. Requires little training.2. Does not affect other installed
programs.
2. User Interfaces: easy to understand and simple in a reasonable way.
Score (9)
Xplanner plus1. Ease of Installation: (2 hours)
1. Does not require training.2. Does not affect other installed
programs.
2. User Interfaces: very simple
and straightforward but requires many clicks to perform simple
action.
Score (9)
High Impact Criteria: Documentation
Agilefant1) The installation documentation is
sufficient.
2) The user guide: uses wiki. It is very clear and can be used for training.
3) Support: 1) The Forum: very active (with 141 topics).
2) The Email: effective responses.
Score (8)
Xplanner-plus1) The installation documentation is
brief.
2) The user guide: We are sorry to admit
that there isn't much in term of user documentation. However, the tool is intuitive enough that little documentation is needed.
3) Support:1) The Forum: does not have.
2) The Email: effective responses.
Score (6)
High Impact Criteria: Functionality
Agilefant1) Manager:
1) Provides most of Microsoft Project features.
2) Set Project Roles.3) Nice Dashboard.4) Portfolio management.5) Tracking:
1) Built-In-Time Tracking-System.
2) Effort Spent.6) Communications with teams:
1) Set up automatic Reminders.2) Emails.
7) Generate Reports: (web page or Excel). Roadmap Reports.
High Impact Criteria: Functionality
Xplanner-plus1) Manager:
1) Provides most of Microsoft Project features.
2) Set Project Roles.3) Dashboard (Promising)4) Tracking:
1) Online time tracking and time sheet generation.
2) Effort Spent can not be according to users.
5) Communications with teams:1) Emails. 2) Virtual note cards
6) Generate and export Reports: (XML, MS Project, Excel).
High Impact Criteria: Functionality
Agilefant
1) Developers: Supports prioritization.
Has Product Backlog. Personal work queue Can clearly see what other
developers is planning to do Nice Graphical presentation.
Xplanner-plus
1) Developers: Support TWiki-style text formatting.
Support external tool integration and
extensible wiki word linking.
Drag and Drop stories to next
iteration.
attach notes to stories and tasks.
Multi-select options for actions.
High Impact Criteria: Functionality
Agilefant
Manager: 4 out 4
Developer: 5 out 6
Score (9)
Xplanner-plus
Manager: 3 out of 4
Developer: 5 out 6
Score (8)
High Impact Criteria: Performance
AgilefantAlthough it is rich of
features, it has a high performance and responds to project’s changes.
Score (9)
Xplanner-plusSometimes, it has a bug
on a main feature which is reporting.
Score (7)
Low Impact Criteria: Suitability
AgilefantPerforms well on
large teams.As result, it performs
well on large projects too.
Score (5)
Xplanner-plusIt is painful to use it
for more than 20 people.
As a result, it is hard to use it for managing large projects.
Score (3)
Low Impact Criteria: Stability
AgilefantSometimes it crashes
when using secondary features but it is rich of features.
Score (4)
Xplanner-plusit is very rear to
crash.
Score (5)
Low Impact Criteria: Scalability
AgilefantIt could collect and
efficiently display Large amounts of data.
Score (5)
Xplanner-plusIt is slower when
dealing with large amounts of data and many users.
Score (3)
Results
High Impact CriteriaCriterion Agilefant Xplanner-
plusMinimal
Requirements9 10
Usability 9 9
Documentation 8 6
Functionality 9 8
Performance 8 7
Total Scores 43 40
Low Impact CriteriaCriterion Agilefant Xplanner-plus
Suitability 5 3
Stability 4 5
Scalability 5 3
Total Scores
14 11
CONCLUSION
Agilefant is a simple but it is very capable tool and a powerful solution. It brings together the perspectives of organizing daily work, long-term product and release planning and project portfolio management.
We would recommend using Agilefant over xplanner-plus.
Thank YouQuestions ?
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