Agile Commons

Today and tomorrow I will be both speaking at and attending the 2008 Agile Development Practices Conference in Orlando, Florida. I’ll be blogging live from the event and will provide summaries of the keynotes and the sessions I attend. If you’re attending the ADP Conference, come by and check out the Agile Contracting session that Rachel Weston and I will be giving today at 12:45 pm. There are so many great sessions at this year’s event, I wish they’d spread it out over 3 or 4 days.

Check out the sessions that I think are worth attending and my live conference updates at http://edgehopper.com/category/conf_reports/ .

Many software development organizations work within the bounds of contractual agreements where the limitations imposed by the “Iron Triangle” of fixed timelines, budgets, and scope challenge their ability to embrace change and focus on value delivery. Agile practitioners often comment that agile contracting is a difficult problem, but proven solutions are rarely presented.

Rachel Weston and Chris Spagnuolo will offer some tools they have used in their own agile contracting work to help agile practitioners deal with different contracting scenarios while promoting agile practices, protecting the development organization, and still providing value and protection to the client’s organization. Through a combined workshop and facilitated collaborative session, Rachel and Chris will present new agile contracting tools that can be added to your toolbox. You will gain a deeper understanding of the problems associated with agile contracting as well as practical solutions for dealing with contracts in an agile manner.

If you're going to be attending ADP this week in Orlando, Rachel and Chris will be conducting the session "Agile Contracting" on Wednesday, November at 12:45 pm. 

For more information on Agile Contracting, check out EdgeHopper's Agile Contracting Section.

The folks at Yahoo! coined the phrase Single Wringable Neck to describe the paradigm shift that is the Product Owner role--that the *business* must truly own defining value and accepting done work.

Yet for many organizations, one person cannot fill that role.  Instead, it takes a village to raise a product backlog, groom it for value and success, and coordinate the work of several teams and projects to release a successful product. 

I will explore the challenge of organizing to fill the Product Owner role in my session at the Agile Development Practices conference in Orlando, FL, next week.  Come join me to explore some patterns I've seen, review successes and challenges of those patterns, share tales of Agile product ownership, and, I hope, discover some new ideas and patterns (or antipatterns).

"It Takes a Village: Organizing to Fulfill the Product Owner Role" by Ronica Roth, Wed 12 Nov, 12:45 pm ET.

Come visit Rally representatives at our table at this event! Deep Agile provides you an opportunity to get beyond the buzzwords and introductory agile ideas to get you thinking!

What: Deep Agile 2008: Not as Easy as you Thought!
When: November 8-9, 2008, 9:00am to 5:00pm (Registration opens at 8:30am)
Where: MIT, Cambridge, MA - Room E51-345 Hosted by Jay Conne

Spaces are limited to 90 in this MIT seminar room and they're going fast. So register now! Go to http://agilebazaar.org/

“Not as Easy as You Thought”

A 2-Day Intensive Conversation With James Coplien and Bob Martin

The sparks will fly when two passionate professionals - Jim Coplien and Bob Martin - square off to make the world safe for software development. In the corner of architecture, patterns and agile is Jim Coplien. Driving the necessity of test based design is "Uncle Bob" Martin.

Each will use their long track records, numerous case studies, and success stories to argue that they have the answers you need to deliver successful projects and products. The difference here is that we are presenting both sides of the story, and working with Jim and Bob to show how both approaches meet in the arena of professional software development.

Only $650 at the Standard rate. We’ll make it even easier – when you register, enter the discount code of DA2008R8DQ8 for a further $50 off. You’ll pay only $600 – a full $95 savings off the last minute price of $695!

Sessions Offered: 
* What Makes Agile Hard to deliver?
         Don’t repeat others’ mistakes – find out how the
         experts handle the recurrent problems that plague
         Agile initiatives.

* Agile and Architecture: How Much is enough?
         Can good design emerge from TDD or should you use
         patterns to create an architecture up-front?

* Agile and Patterns
         As co-founder of the software patterns community,
         James Coplien has some strong opinions on where
         Agilistas are going wrong.

* TDD – Essential Discipline or Harmful Fad?
         Can Test Driven Development create bad habits, or
         poor design? You can’t find two more knowledgeable
         gurus to debate it than Bob and Jim!

* Evening Pub Session: Patterns on Steroids
         Gaze into the depths from whence emerged the patterns
         concepts – where else but at a pub, over beers, with
         James Coplien!

* Lean vs. Agile
         How does a philosophy born in manufacturing guide
         software architecture? Or should it? Find out where it
         matches or misses.

* Agile and Professionalism
         Good software architecture is at the core of too many
         essential services and products for us *not* to consider
         this a profession. But what does that entail?

* Panel Discussion/Open Discussion
         Your chance to join in the discussion of the two days’
         content with the speakers and panelists. Test out your
         new insights!

Registration and More Details at http://agilebazaar.org/