agile management tools

Even the most agile project likely uses some kind of tools – index cards, whiteboards, etc. I recently checked out a few agile project management tools to help me with a small, but globally distributed, project. (Without continuously-on high-powered video support across the oceans, whiteboards and index cards are just too hard for everyone on the team to see 😉) After a quick check of ThoughtWorks’ Mingle, Rally Development’s VersionOne, TargetProcess, and Pivotal Labs’ Tracker, I decided to try out Tracker for my team. My main reasons:

  • it’s free for our team size (under 5 people),
  • it’s hosted (zero installation effort, and provides easy access from anywhere for globally distributed teammates),
  • it’s reputed to be fairly simple and straightforward to use.

Although I’m all in favor of applying appropriate rigor (e.g. using a method like AHEAD) to software technology evaluations for which the business consequences warrant it, in this case, ‘doing the simplest thing that could possibly work’ didn’t appear to require anything sophisticated. I’ll post later on how well it works for us. I’d love to hear from anyone who has used them, or other tools, for similar geographically-distributed team situations.

6 Responses to “agile management tools”

  1. Karen says:

    Today I found a recent discussion on the topic of agile PM tools in the LinkedIn group for the Agile Alliance. The answers mostly recommend lo-fi solutions for teams just getting started, which I concur with; however, the question was targeted at non-distributed projects (i.e. not like ours).

    One respondent suggested a tool combination I had not considered earlier, Jira with Greenhopper. I’m going to take a look at it before our next iteration; found one hint on how to set it up here.

  2. Karen says:

    So far I have experimented with Pivotal Tracker and with Rally Community Edition. Both have clear strengths – Tracker is simpler but also a bit more confining; Rally is more powerful and flexible, but has been more difficult to learn to use. I’ve decided to continue using both, with different 2009 research projects – will post near year end to summarize my experiences.

  3. Karen says:

    thanks to a colleague at work, I recently had a chance to try out Redmine. kinda cool – some limitations but very easy to use – I’d definitely suggest it be included in a shortlist if a hosted solution isn’t required (i.e. you can install and host it yourself).

  4. Hi Karen,
    Could you please share your opinion about Readmine vs .. “Rally Community Edition”, etc.
    Did you find that features Readmine provide you enough features ?

  5. Karen says:

    Hi Andrey – thank you for your comment and interest! I did find Redmine promising, and I liked the transparency of its integration with Subversion. I am looking at several other hosted solutions now for another purpose (considering a more in-depth exercise of ScrumDesk and VersionOne). What have your experiences been with these kinds of tools?

  6. Karen says:

    Hi Andrey – thank you for your comment and interest! I did find Redmine promising, and I liked the transparency of its integration with Subversion. I am looking at several other hosted solutions now for another purpose (considering a more in-depth exercise of ScrumDesk and VersionOne). What have your experiences been with these kinds of tools?