CHAPTER THREE

What is the difference between agile values, principles and

techniques?
The Agile Manifesto is comprised of 4 foundational values and 12
supporting principles which lead the agile approach to software
development. Each Agile Technique applies the four values in different
ways.
Based on your understanding, summarize the agile manifesto
(values).
1. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools.
2. Working software over comprehensive documentation.
3. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation.
4. Responding to change over following a plan.
Agile philosophy is to welcome changes. Discuss!
Expect the system requirements to change and so design the
system to accommodate these changes.
Simplicity is essential. Discuss!
Focus on simplicity in both the software being developed and the
development process. Wherever possible, actively work to
eliminate complexity from the system.
What is the difference between micro-managed and self-
managed team? Which is best?
The micro-managed is a management style whereby a manager closely
observes and controls the work.
The members of self-managed team plan and manage their day-to-day
activities and duties under reduced or no supervision.
The best: In my opinion, none of them, because they represent the two
extremes of managing types.
Based on your understanding, discuss the following terms:
Incremental planning: Requirements are recorded on story cards and
the stories to be included in a release are determined by the time
available and their relative priority.
Test driven development: An automated unit test framework is used to
write tests for a new piece of functionality before that functionality
itself is implemented.
Customer involvement: Customers should be closely involved
throughout the development process.
Continuous integration: As soon as the work on a task is complete, it is
integrated into the whole system. After any such integration, all the
unit tests in the system must pass.
Pair programming: Developers work in pairs, checking each other’s
work and providing support to always do a good job.
Mention some benefits of pair programming.
 Knowledge sharing.
 Encourage refactoring.

Mention the different levels of requirements in agile

requirement specification activity.
1. Theme.
2. EPIC.
3. User story.
What is user story? What are the main components of user
story?
User story: is a description of a small valuable functionality.
Components:
 Title: <A name for the user story>
 As a: <A user or persona>
 I want to: <Take an action>
 So that: <A benefit is realized>
What is the difference between user story and epic?
Epic is a large feature with insufficient details.
User story is a description of a small valuable functionality.
What is the Definition of Done? Who is responsible to put such
definition?
The DoD is when all acceptance criteria that a software product must
satisfy are met and ready to be accepted by a user.
DoD is created by the scrum team.
Mention some items that would be valid in the definition of
done.
 Unit test passed.
 Code reviewed.
 Functional tests passed.
 The owner accepts the user story.
A good user story is the one that is independent, valuable,
estimable and negotiable. Discuss!
Independent > implemented at any order.
Valuable > to customers.
Estimable > easy to estimate throughout its life time.
Negotiable > stories are not contracts.
What is the difference between TDD and Code-first
development?
Test-driven > write the test before the code.
Code-first > write the code before the test.
What is Agile Scrum? What is it used for?
Scrum is an agile project management methodology used for software
development projects with the goal of delivering new software
capability every 2-4 weeks.
What is the role product owner and scrum master in agile
team?
Product owner > identify product features or requirements, prioritize
these for development and continuously review the product backlog to
ensure that the project continues to meet critical business needs.
Scrum master > responsible for ensuring that the Scrum processes
followed and guides the team in the effective use of Scrum.
What is the difference between spring & release?
Sprint:
 Time boxed development cycle within a release.
 Usually 2-4 weeks
Release:
 Ready to be used by end users.
 3-6 months.
What is meant by: product backlog, velocity, potentially
shippable product?
Product backlog: a list of ‘to do’ items which the Scrum team must
tackle.
Velocity: how much product backlog effort that a team can cover in a
single sprint.
Potentially shippable product: The software increment that is
delivered from a sprint.
What is the measurement metric for user stories?
Story points.
How do you estimate the velocity of the team for a new
project? Mention the methods used of quantifying team
velocity.
Velocity estimation:
1. Sort velocities.
 2. Find 90% confidence interval.
3. Find the median.
4. Find the standard deviation.
The methods:
 Pilot sprint.
 Dry run.
What is burn-down chart? What is it used for?
A burn down chart > is a graphical representation of work left to do
versus time.
Useful for predicting when all of the work will be completed.