Agile Engineering

I had the pleasure to meet Ryan Shriver last week at Tom Gilb’s seminar. Ryan had some very interesting ideas, experience and suggestions about Agile Software Development and Tom’s EVO process.

In fact, Ryan had independently arrived at many of the same conclusions I had about Agile, management and the future of development. He also gave me a new term, a new piece of the jigsaw which I think helps make sense of the world: Agile Engineering.

Ryan doesn’t claim to have invented the term but he did define it using seven points:

        1.        Deliver Value
        2.        Quantify Qualities
        3.        Reduce Feedback Cycles
        4.        Explore Alternatives
        5.        Last Responsible Moment
        6.        Front-to-Back
        7.        Test-Driven Development

This list will look familiar to anyone who knows about Agile Software Development but it is subtly different and allows for greater scope in the engineering, management and development of software systems.

Like me Ryan has seen the limitations of Agile Software Development and, like me, sees the need to go further. As it originated - in XP, in Scrum, etc. - Agile Software Development doesn’t go far enough to address requirements, design, large systems, and a whole bunch of other things you have to do to manage software development.

This is where Agile Engineering comes in, it includes Agile Software Development but is about more than just Agile Software Development.

Ryan Shriver has some presentations online which should expand on this. (He had a busy week last week, as well as presenting at Tom Gilb’s London seminar he also presented at Agile ITX in Reston, Virginia.)

So, Agile Software Development is Dead, long live Agile Engineering!