Planning for Agile Projects

Question 1

Affinity estimating

Answer 1

Way of grouping user stories into similar categories or collections. For example, in IT we may group by hardware, software, data and network. Groups similar stories and then uses relative estimating for the stories.

Question 2

Agile discovery

Answer 2

Means the project team discovers through experiments and innovation the best approach to accomplish their work

Question 3

Architectural spike

Answer 3

Is experimentation that the team performs early in the project to prove that what they’re trying to accomplish in the project is feasible, it’s a proof of concept exercise. It’s a time boxed effort to test your approach, make sure you have the right architecture and approach to build the software.

Question 4

Ceremonies

Answer 4

Are the meetings and events in an agile project. Include sprint planning meetings, daily standup meetings, iteration reviews, and iteration retrospectives.

Question 5

Course-grained requirements

Answer 5

Are high level chunky descriptions of the project requirements

Question 6

Cone of uncertainty

Answer 6

Describes how a large range of uncertainty exists at the beginning of the project and over time with experience the cone becomes smaller and smaller because certainty increases.

Question 7

Convergence graphs

Answer 7

Shows how initial estimates are flawed and over time, with progressive elaboration, that the range of variance gets smaller and smaller and the certainty of estimates increases

Question 8

Epics

Answer 8

Large user stories that are too large for just one iteration. Epics can span diff projects in some cases. Epics are placeholders for a collection of 5 or more related user stories.

Question 9

Fibonacci sequence

Answer 9

Pattern of numbers where each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers. For example, zero plus one equals one. One plus one equals two. And so on… think of the shell

Question 10

Fine-grained requirements

Answer 10

Much more detailed and particular and are specific on acceptability requirements

Question 11

First time, first-use penalty

Answer 11

Describes a condition where the project team has never done this type of work. Penalty is the work may take longer and/or cost more than anticipated

Question 12

Ideal time

Answer 12

Describes the ideal amount of time it will take to create the items in the backlog. This estimate doesn’t consider interruptions or delays in the project work.

Question 13

INVEST

Answer 13

Is a use story acronym to confirm that user stories are 
Independent
Negotiable
Valuable
Estimable
Small
Testable

Question 14

Iteration backlog

Answer 14

Is the backlog of use stories the team has selected to accomplish in the current iteration

Question 15

Iteration H

Answer 15

Is called thus because it’s the iteration that involves hardening or a hardening sprint to clean up and stabilize the code. It helps wrap up the project for release and it’s all about stabilizing the code and refactoring everything for a good clean release.

Question 16

Iteration zero

Answer 16

Is the first iteration or sprint where the team establishes the development environment. The team builds out the test servers, databases, and preparing for JUnit or NUnit testing. It’s also where your team will establish continuous integration architecture, design team rules, and if co-located setup the war room.

Question 17

Parkinson’s law

Answer 17

States that work expands to fill the time allotted to it. Describes the danger of including padding in estimate sizes as it’ll always expand to what it’s given.

Question 18

Planning poker

Answer 18

Uses cards with the Fibonacci sequence of 1,2,3,5,8. PM and team look at each user story and everyone privately choses whichever poker card they think correctly sizes the story. Everyone flips cards. then in unison and discussion about how to size from there.

Question 19

Product boxes

Answer 19

Is a mockup of your project solution as if it were for sale and contained in a product box on a store shelf. The product box show the value of what the project is creating. It’s a way of visualizing what the top features of the product are.

Question 20

Product roadmap

Answer 20

Big picture of the functionality the team’s deliverables and how that satisfies the product vision.

Question 21

Product vision

Answer 21

Summary to communicate the project’s end goal. Vision statement describes how the project’s product will differ from competitor’s products and support the overall strategy of the organization.

Question 22

Progressive elaboration

Answer 22

Is an adaptive planning technique that starts with a broad idea of the project and breaks it down into smaller and smaller items and components as the project progresses.

Question 23

Release plan

Answer 23

Defines a set of requirements that when completed may be released. Determines when we are going to have releases available. Project manager, product owner, and project team determine the next set of functionalities that can be released as part of an incremental approach.

Question 24

Risk-based spike

Answer 24

Is a brief investigation the team performs early in the project to identify and test risks within the project.

Question 25

Rolling wave planning

Answer 25

Uses waves of planning and then executing and is characteristic of adaptive projects.

Question 26

Sizing t-shirts

Answer 26

Determining and sorting true sizes by comparing them. It’s a type of affinity estimating.

Question 27

Slicing

Answer 27

Process of breaking down a large user story into smaller stories or tasks.

Question 28

Story points

Answer 28

Points assigned to user stories for purposes of sizing them. Large worth 5, medium worth 3, small worth 1 is an example.

Question 29

Three Cs of user stories

Answer 29

Card - index card with just enough info to ID the story
Conversation - communication from between customer and development team on the details
Confirmation - customer confirmation that the story has been implemented correctly in the product

Question 30

Timeboxing

Answer 30

A predetermined, fixed duration for a project event

Question 31

User story

Answer 31

A small chunk of biz functionality. Written from the customer’s perspective and describe a feature of the product you’re creating

Question 32

User story backlog

Answer 32

Also known as the product backlog, contains all the requirements in a user story format

Question 33

User story formula

Answer 33

Includes role, functionality and benefit: As a I want this so that I’ll receive this

Question 34

Value-based analysis

Answer 34

Examines the biz value and assesses the worth of what the project will create. This is the business benefit minus the cost of the project

Question 35

Value-based decomposition

Answer 35

Is a visual decomposition of the project scope, requirements, features, or risk. This is a way to examine the requirements and determine the value of each requirement for prioritization and relationships among the components.

Question 36

Wideband Delphi Technique

Answer 36

Sometimes just called the delphi technique has rounds of anonymous surveys to create estimates, gather risks, or gather requirements. It helps to build consensus without everyone following one person’s point of view.