OpenSource applications for modeling agile projects
See also: TaskDatabase, TrackingTool, KeepingTrackOfStories, WriteItOnaCard.
On SourceForge, I found the following projects that claim to be XP planning software.
(Please provide more feedback if you have it.)
- XPlanner (http://www.xplanner.org/)
- This is a Java based web application. It requires JDK 1.4 or later, Tomcat 4 or later, and a relational database such as MySQL. There is no binary download, so the installation process is quite a dare. The installation of Xplanner is more complex than the installation of XPweb, and you need to install, for example, j2sdk 1.4, mysql4, tomcat 4: it's a lot of software. Xplanner lacks in external tools support but its development is in progress. At our company, we tried to use it, but discarded it because it's rigidityand lack of features. There is one frame of mind about how to set up a project, and no leeway. You cannot, e.g., move a task to another iteration, or leave it unassigned.
The information above concerning XPlanner is outdated. For example, you can move tasks between iterations and/or leave it unassigned (the latter was never a restriction). Many teams have found XPlanner to be more than flexible enough for their needs. XPlanner focusses on planning support rather than trying to be a jack-of-all-trades by including wikis, CVS, bug tracking, document management, etc. It does support various integration stategies with external tools using an extensible wiki-like syntax, through a SOAP API, or through exported data to a variety of formats. At our company we had a nice integration with Jira for bug tracking and TWiki for recording story information not directly related to planning or tracking.
Also, the URL for the project page is dead now. It appears that http://xplanner.codehaus.org works, but even some hyperlinks on that site point to the old xplanner.org site. Development is long dead by now (2013), however, see below...
- XPlannerPlus (http://xplanner-plus.sourceforge.net)
- This project picked up where the old XPlanner project left off, expanding the features and making the interface a bit fancier, and is under active development.
- XPweb (http://xpweb.sourceforge.net/)
- XPweb is a PHP4 based web application. MR found that xpweb is easy to install, in particular because of its auto_db_installation (you need to install Apache, PHP and MySql,but there are some packages that install everything at once). There is an eclipse plugin called ecliXPweb (http://eclixpweb.sourceforge.net/), but its development seems to be dead, and it does not work in its current state under eclipse 3. This seems a very extensive project. In any case, the HTML that is generated is a bit over the top, since not everything works on some browsers (e.g., Safari on Mac OS X -that is not true! being the creator of XPWeb, I work on a mac ;-)). XpWeb? seems to have more functionality and be more mature than xplanner. The demo site, at least, is also very slow. At our company, we tried to use it, but discarded it, because the user interface makes it too slow to work with and weird in some places, and the calculations are too rigid. An entire projectstructure is displayed on 1 page. This makes it extremely time consuming to set up a project with more then 5 tasks, since you need to wait for the page to download, and then scroll, each time. Changing some fields has side effects that are unexpected (although the side effects are explained in the help section). The calculations for estimates, and actual duration, cannot take into account pair programming, or more people working together, and cannot be used to do planning.
- AgileTrack? (http://agiletrack.org/)
- AgileTrack? is a Java based application for tracking software development in small XP or agile development teams. It includes support for managing stories, sub-tasks, tracking time, managing multiple projects, planning iterations, and providing iteration reports. It uses JDIC to provide a unique system tray based interface. It is meant to be simple to use and allow users to have task information always at their fingertips.
- AgilePlace (http://www.agileplace.com/)
- This is a Java 1.1 applet-based webpage that works on most regular browsers with Java enabled. AgilePlace is a fully collaborative online planning game simulation. Index cards can be dropped on the webpage by any user and these cards are seen (and can be moved collaboratively) by all other users looking at the page. Users can create an account on the site to get their own planning game projects complete with sizeable tables, iterations, etc. There is no software to install. Index cards can be exported to a bulleted list.
- Agility (http://www.agileedge.com/)
- Agility from AgileEdge is a hosted Issue, Bug and Requirements Tracker. It is very cusomizable so you can customize it to meet your needs. You can for example create a new Case Type called Test Case and then add a new Custom Field to it called Passed with values of Yes and No. In addition Agility is hierarchical, so you can define a hierarchy of Cases. You can create a User Story that has 1 to many Test Cases that must pass before the User Story is accepted. As of 29 April 2005, the hosted version is about $50/month while a run-it-yourself license is about $900 (all prices in US dollars, rounded for convenience).
- ProjectPlanningAndTrackingSystem (http://ses-ppts.sourceforge.net)
- PPTS is a OpenSource, WEB-based environment supporting teams who have chosen to develop software according to the agile methodologies Scrum and/or eXtreme Programming. It's functionality comprises:
- administration of project, iteration and resource attributes
- prioritizable product backlog
- work breakdown structure (sprint backlog)
- metrics (velocity and estimated/spent effort)
- burndown and progress charts
- calendars
- resource allocation
- fine grained access to information based on overall role (administrator or user) or role in project (projectleader, developer or customer)
- customization of menus and language (both English and Dutch available)
- interfacing with PR/CR tools (Mantis and Bugzilla)
The following projects seem uninteresting on SourceForge.
- Gergometer (http://gergometer.sourceforge.net/)
- Java based. Plots progress of stories within an iteration graphically. On SourceForge, it is inactive now, and has no releases, but plenty of CVS activity. It is unclear in which context this tool can be used from superficial inspection of the project description, but it seems it is standalone, and would require separate input of all project data for this purpose.
The following projects are dead on SourceForge.
- XP-PM (Perl eXtreme Programming Project Manager -- http://sourceforge.net/projects/xp-pm/)
- Perl library. The project is inactive on SourceForge, with no commits. There are no releases here.
- ontrack (http://sourceforge.net/projects/ontrack/)
- Java Based. The project is inactive on SourceForge, with no commits. There are no releases here.
- whip (http://sourceforge.net/projects/whip/)
- The project is inactive on SourceForge, with no commits. There are no releases here.
- Agile Project Manager (http://xpmanager.sourceforge.net/)
- Java based fat application (Swing). The project is inactive on SourceForge. There are no releases here, but there is some code in the CVS repository.
- XP Cardfile (http://sourceforge.net/projects/cardfile/)
- The project is inactive on SourceForge, with no commits. There are no releases here.
Commercial applications for modeling agile projects
Other programs for modelling projects in a conventional fashion
TargetProcess:Planning (http://www.targetprocess.com) is a FREE ASP.NET based agile project management tool that focused on Project Planning and Tracking practices. It supports all iterative processes, but encourages to use Extreme Programming planning style.
Project Planning Software