WRAP 2.3 release features Virtual Taskboard, Role Based Security and Change History
It was just six months ago that we announced the release of WRAP 2.0, which raised the bar for agile software development with features including data mart, built-in analytics, Web 2.0 collaboration, and SSL security. Today, we’ve empowered our users even more with the release of WRAP 2.3. This release reflects thousands of hours of hard work, and a tight focus on delivering the features that you want and need most.
We at WoodRanch, as they say in the industry, “eat our own dog food.” You can count on a robust, feature rich, secure and complete release, created using our own agile software development methods. Because WRAP is delivered as a Software-as-a-Service, you don’t need to do anything to take advantage of this powerful new release—the new features will be immediately available to you and all you need to do is take advantage of them.
WRAP’s New Virtual Taskboard
One of the most powerful features in version 2.3 is our Virtual Taskboard, which gives you an at-a-glance view of everything you need to know about any project iteration. Each task is displayed as a card in a vertical “swim lane”, and the intuitive display lets project managers easily view the overall progress of each project. You can apply filters to the Taskboard, to get a view of all items relating to a specific iteration or project owner. And as each item moves to the next stage, tasks can be dragged and dropped between vertical lanes, and the status of the user story will be automatically updated.
Your Agile Development is Always Secure
Software-as-a-service delivery in general is often much more secure than on-premises software solutions, and this is true with WRAP 2.3 as well. While there has been some debate about security models in SaaS, the advantage to the SaaS model is that security is built-in to the architecture, on top of whatever on-premises firewall security you already have in place.
WRAP 2.3 introduces role-based security, which ensures that everybody has access to what they need, but only what they need. Individual users can be assigned specific roles (such as Administrator, Manager, Member, or Guest), each with a different set of access to features and data. In addition, SSL encryption protects the integrity of data transmission for all users, including those with a free account.
What else is new in WRAP 2.3?
We’ve also introduced a “change history” feature that lets you track the complete change history for all agile artifacts. You can use this feature to view the change history for any given user story, task, defect, iteration, and release. We’ve also added an email notification delivery feature, several enhancements to the Team Member page, and the ability to set a user’s status to “Inactive”.
We’re very pleased to offer you this feature-packed upgrade, and look forward to your comments and feedback.
The highest priority for every software development organization is delivering quality software. How is quality in software defined? The most obvious measure of quality is that the software is reasonably free of defects (commonly referred to as bugs). Another quality measure is based on how well the software meets requirements and customer expectations. A third measure of quality is the maintainability of the software. When software is so complex or poorly written that it’s difficult to change, it becomes nearly impossible to fix defects without introducing new problems.
Targeting Software Defects
Of all the software quality issues, software defects are the costliest. According to a 2002 study conducted by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), software bugs cost the U.S. economy roughly $59 billion per year. The increasing complexity of software has led to a far great potential for defects, causing the typical software development organization to spend approximately 80% of their costs on finding and fixing defects.
“More than half of the costs are borne by software users, and the remainder by software developers and vendors,” NIST said in summarizing the findings. “More than a third of these costs … could be eliminated by an improved testing infrastructure that enables earlier and more effective identification and removal of software defects.”
You can read the full NIST report here.
A 2008 study conducted by IDC focused on the impact of software defects on 139 U.S. corporate development organizations. This study found that the cost of fixing defects ranges from $5.2 million to $22 million annually, depending on the size of the organization. A statement issued by IDC summarized the report findings:
“The increased complexity of software development environments and the cost of fixing defects in the field (rather than early in the software cycle) combine in exorbitant ways to drain income and to hamstring businesses as a result of critical software downtime.”
See the full IDC report here.
The purpose of modern development methodologies such as Agile software development is to build quality into the software development process. Most software organizations have come to the realization that improving software review and testing processes can help reduce the number of defects that are released with a software product.
Tracking Software Defects
Even when methodologies such as Agile project management are in place, a certain number of defects will go undetected. It then becomes critically important to track software defects. If an organization has no idea how many defects have been found in its software, then it really doesn’t know where it stands in terms of quality.
Software development teams that achieve long-term success define a target number of acceptable defects for product release. When target defect numbers have been defined, the quality of a software system that’s in development can be determined by comparing the current number of bugs against the target goal.
A software defect tracking system allows a development organization to record, assign and prioritize defects. It can be used to determine quality metrics such as the rate at which defects are found by testers, resolved by developers and the distribution of defects in different areas of the code. Once a defect has been assigned and fixed, the defect tracking system can be used to record the cause of the defect. The information derived from defect causal descriptions can then be used by development managers to help determine which areas of a system are prone to more errors or which teams need additional resources.
Defect trending reports such as those shown below allow managers to measure processes and take appropriate action to improve the overall efficiency and effectiveness of the development organization.
Integrating Software Development with Defect Tracking
A common mistake in software development is to work on system implementation for some amount of time and then turn the system over to a quality assurance team for testing. Due to the complex nature of software development and the tendency of requirements to shift and grow, testing is often squeezed into a brief period of time right before product release.
This approach is no longer viable in the modern world of software development. In order to meet product release schedules with quality, software defect tracking must be used throughout the software development life cycle. Organizations that establish interim development milestones with clearly defined defect goals stand a much better chance of avoiding a release delay due to quality issues.
The integration of software development and defect tracking fits well within the Agile process. Some Agile methodology tools incorporate a defect tracking system that allows development organizations to monitor defects from the time they are reported, associate these with the requirements, and assigned until they are resolved. Identifying and fixing high priority defects early in the development life cycle will decrease the risk of regressions from fixes turning up in the software product.
WoodRanch Agile Project (WRAP) provides Agile methodology tools that help software development organizations improve productivity and efficiency. The WRAP toolset includes defect management functions that allow organizations to track the progress of defects throughout the software development life cycle. With WRAP, defects can be prioritized when found and tracked through resolution, helping organizations to minimize the number of defects in the finished project or product.
Defect tracking can play a significant role in reducing the rate at which defects are introduced and the severity of defects. Effectively tracking defects can reduce costs and improve software quality, resulting in higher customer satisfaction. Defect tracking also helps management prioritize tasks and monitor the overall quality of a software release.
Agile or not, every stakeholder wants visibility into his or her application development projects underway. Some questions and challenges are shared among most organizations. Regardless of which project you work on, where you work, or what methodologies you adopt, you have most likely asked yourself many questions like these at various stages of your software development process:
1. Will the project be delivered on time?
2. Is the project ahead or behind?
3. Are teams and resources fully utilized?
4. Do I need more resources?
5. How good is the quality of systems in development?
6. What is the rate of defects?
7. What is the cause of defects?
8. How critical are these defects?
9. How can I reduce the rate and significance of defects occurring in the system?
10. How much time is being spent on maintenance versus building new features?
11. Is the team working on highest priority requirements?
12. Are we able to distinguish the highest priority requirements?
13. Are issues, concerns, and blocking items visible and escalated on time?
14. Have we identified risks? Do we have an adequate plan to manage them?
15. Is the team motivated?
16. Is the team committed?
17. Is some team member falling behind, blocked, and in need of help?
18. How can I balance the workload instead of having to deal with peaks and valleys?
19. How do I align external teams and maintain transparency?
20. Am I spending money on right priorities with best long-term returns?
21. What is the customer response to what we are building? Are we delivering value?
The list of questions can go on and on. And even though such questions and challenges are well known, it is surprisingly difficult to get clear answers and good solutions that would increase your level of confidence in your application development work.
In the upcoming posts, we will take these very questions one by one and start paving the road to answers and solutions. We will go over processes, tools, people issues and best practices.
To make these discussions most relevant to your current needs, we invite your comments and contributions – what application development challenges and questions are bothering you today?
At the beginning of the new year, WoodRanch Tech (WRT) team of seasoned professionals has opened new series of blogs to identify, analyze and address many software development challenges experienced today by project managers, product managers, developers, and other stake holders. We will open discussions about YOUR challenges and experiences. And we will guide you to solutions through exploring best and worst practices seen at organizations of all sizes.
WRT’s blogs in 2010 will be about people, teams, ALM, agile project management, SCRUM, XP, systems, engineering best practices, ideas from other disciplines, ways to improve, program management and all related fields. We will contribute a wide experience in various agile methodologies, RUP and waterfall to our blog discussions. Your ideas for additional topics are always welcome!
We have been successfully running agile scrum and XP projects for more than a decade and helped management and engineers at many large companies like Yahoo, IBM, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Digital Insight (Intuit), Tata and many startups like Webvan to improve their processes and meet their objectives – while being lightweight and agile. We have also helped a company gain ISO 9000 and CMM level 5 certification.
We are not just consultants and trainers that simply convey concepts and discuss problems experienced by others. We are practitioners who have faced the same challenges as you do. Each of us have led engineering teams, architected highly advanced distributed software systems, coded, built, implemented the systems in production, managed support and QA teams, taken products to market using agile, lean and other management and engineering best practices for over two decades.
We look forward to sharing the principles we apply daily in our work with you – our own software development practices and the most successful practices of other organizations.