Chapter 3. Which AM Should I Use? | Extreme Programming Perspectives

Michele Marchesi

People's attitudes toward communication, user involvement, and frequent releases is more important than the specific process you use. However, if you are a novice in the field, and you want to introduce an agile methodology into your shop, this chapter gives you some advice.

At last you have decided that agile methodologies (AMs) are worth a try, and now you are looking for the right methodology to introduce in a pilot project at your firm. Unfortunately, many AMs happen to be waiting for your decision. Which one should you use?

The first thing to consider is that not all AMs are at the same level. One, Extreme Programming (XP), is quite different from the others because it is a set of very detailed planning, design, and programming practices. The other AMs are much less detailed and typically cover only the planning and project management phases. The programming practices are left to the team's choice. In fact, many XP practices are also recommended by the other AMs, and there are efforts to merge XP with them.

Now let's examine the main AMs, and I'll give some advice on what to choose. (These are, of course, my personal opinions.)