Next generation Agile: Guide to continuous development

Introduction

Today's top trend with software development leaders is continuous development. Cloud infrastructure and mobile applications are still major aspects within the field. Read on to learn how these trends are changing the face of enterprise software development and what project managers can do to keep their teams on top.

1Continuous delivery-

The wave of continuous development in IT

Many of the advantages Agile holds over Waterfall boil down to shorter cycle times. Faster cycle times make working features available more quickly. Increased feedback improves quality. Restricting the scope of each deployment reduces risks. These advantages seem to magnify as the length of each iteration shrinks. Continuous development is the natural progression of iteration times shrinking into insignificance. Through heavy use of automation, flexible infrastructure and modular architecture, software development leaders have come to the point where each code change is its own deployment.

Check out the links below to learn more about continuous development, how it works and how to start your team on the path to continuously delivering business value.

2Virtualizing-

Agile in the clouds

Virtualized infrastructure is an enormously important component in a successful software development organization. Manually provisioning environments is simply too slow and too error prone when compared with the available automated alternatives today. Virtualizing might mean renting from a major public cloud provider like AWS, or investing in your own private cloud. Either way, having the ability to quickly produce and configure development and testing environments that match production is a must.

Check out the articles in this section to learn about public and private cloud options, their benefits and challenges, and how to manage an Agile development team around them.

Tip

Planning for new projects with private cloud hardware

There are many considerations for building a private cloud, especially with a tight budget. Keep costs in check by carefully planning out hardware, capacity, storage and networking. Continue Reading

News

News on enterprise cloud migrations from AWS partner

2nd Watch manages enterprise workloads in AWS. Learn about trends and wish list items in this Q&A with the firm's new CEO. Continue Reading

News

How cloud apps can benefit from Agile

In this Agile 2014 session preview, a senior software consultant explains how cloud app development can benefit from Agile methodologies. Continue Reading

Tip

How Agile teams manage cloud projects

Learn the risks and benefits of managing cloud projects with Agile teams. Continue Reading

News

Networking blogs about Agile approach to development

This week, bloggers endorse the Agile approach to development and offer their reaction to VMware's new hybrid cloud service. Continue Reading

News

Success with public cloud

As the Financial Times migrates data workloads to the cloud, CTO John O'Donovan explains FT's cloud strategy Continue Reading

Feature

Best DevOps and cloud management tools

Vote for best DevOps and cloud management technology tool in the Modern Infrastructure Impact Awards. Continue Reading

Feature

How to move on from cloud deployment heartbreak

When it comes to cloud computing, there are no guarantees. Some cloud projects are destined to fail, but what matters is what you do to fix them. Continue Reading

3Mobile Agile-

Mobile and embedded Agile environments

Mobile and embedded applications may well be the biggest challenge facing software testers and quality engineers. Proliferation of new device types, form factors, firmware and OS versions, and native hardware all present new complications for testers. While mobile territory is still new and does require some innovative thinking, many of the old best practices are still the same. Large development organizations must balance the need for specialized skills in mobile applications with the danger of allowing mobile apps to develop in a separate silo from the rest of the enterprise applications.

Check out these articles to learn about the techniques and technologies that make mobile and embedded software a workable part of today's enterprise application landscape.

4Agile support-

Agile teams and Agile ALM

There's a very human face to today's Agile development trends. The tools and technology are great, but without the people and processes to put them to work, nothing gets done. There is no tool that can transform the corporate culture or instill a spirit of continuous improvement in the team. These are the challenges that project managers must meet head-on. ALM tools can help, but the real work is in getting development teams to engage with the new processes, to shape them and to be shaped by them.

Check out these articles to find out more about the Agile mind-set and managing an Agile lifecycle.

5Keywords-

Agile terms to know

Get a better understanding of how Agile relates to cloud computing, embedded software and mobile in this section. Find definitions related to continuous development and Agile methodologies here.