[pypy-dev] How agile is PyPy?

[Beatrice During]

Hi there

On Wed, 28 Sep 2005, Laura Creighton wrote:

>
> One thing that is rareley mentioned but rather important for agile
> development is the measurement of how often you _get it wrong_.  (Or
> at least, throw it out.)  This is because the results run counter to
> traditional metrics of software development.  Agility means the
> ability to get it wrong.  So -- within limits -- more wrong is better.
>
> In traditional, completely non-agile, development, there is only time
> to build one implementation.  You must get it correct the first time.
> Therefore you spend forever sitting down and planning 'the correct way
> to do something'.  And then you do it.  Of course, fairly soon it
> becomes obvious that the very best plan you could come up with
> overlooked certain very important things.  And this is just too bad,
> because you don't have time to do things except the one way, so you
> have to make as few changes to the master plan as possible ... and so
> it goes.  Eventually, over time, the software can no longer stand the
> new demands that are put on it, and it is time to rewrite from scratch.
> You just cannot patch it up any more.
>
> In agile development you rewrite a lot of small things a lot.  Instead
> of discussing what is the best way to implement feature Q, you can
> just go off and _build_ 3 ways to implement feature Q, and then look
> at them and measure them, if it is appropriate, and see what is
> better.  But because you have the ability to persue different ways of
> doing things, you end up throwing out a lot of code.
>
> You also need language support for this -- you can talk all you like
> about agile development, but some languages are so hard to write code
> in that you really will not have time to try 3 or 5 or 7
> implementations of an idea.  Plus having sweated bricks to make one,
> you are in love with your own code, and find it hard to toss it when
> the opportunity arises.
>
> So if you aren't throwing out a lot of code, then you aren't being
> very agile.  I'd say we're excellent on that score.

So the infrastructure for being able to do that (our entire test suite) is 
a key component for "throwing away"? How does our automated test suites 
fare in comparison with other OSS/agile projects?
(Relax Holger ;-)

> Also -- while traditional agile methodolgies talk about _responding_
> to change -- generally from the customer -- we don't have any.  So we
> make change just because we think it would be a good -- or interesting
> thing to do.  We're not responding to outside pressures.  Indeed, we
> would like it if the EU was a bit more flexible, and we could make
> some changes to our proposal on the basis of what we have learned by
> doing.  But the EU is not very agile, and poor at responding to
> changes desired by funded project consortia.

I agree - so to summarize - within the community and the boundary of the 
PyPy project we are really fullfilling agile thoughts and values - but the 
EU boundaries of the projects is "dampening" our "Ability to continuously 
learn" and "Responsibly responding to change" - more?

Thanks for your thoughts on this Laura!

Cheers

Bea


> Laura
>
> In a message of Tue, 27 Sep 2005 22:20:52 +0200, Beatrice During writes:
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>>
>> Hi there
>>
>> I am working on documenting PyPy (the project) as a showcase of agile
>> development. In order to be able to do this I would love to get some
>> thoughts and reflections from you who are working on /following PyPy and
>> the question is of course - how agile are we?
>>
>> Here is some short notes on success factors of agile approaches (from an
>> eworkshop in 2002 - Cockburn, Beck etc,
>> http://fc-md.umd.edu/projects/Agile/Summary/SummaryPF.htm):
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> In general, the group agreed that the following are the success factors
>> for agile development:
>>
>> §         Negotiation: If people are willing to keep talking and learning,
>> 	  you are, almost by definition, agile.
>>
>> §         Ability to continuously learn
>>
>> §         Responsibly responding to change.
>>
>> §         Environment where rapid communication is enabled.
>>
>> §         Team reasonably in charge of its own destiny (being allowed to
>> 	  succeed).
>>
>> §         People are valued over other factors
>>
>> §         The team needs to be more than just able, it needs to actually
>>           succeed. There needs to be a support network for each
>> 	  individual in the
>> 	  team to make a contribution however small.
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> How does these factors apply to PyPy and this community? Are we doing
>> other things that is not mentioned here that is working well for us? Thin
>> gs we could do better?
>>
>> Your responses will be part of documentation about PyPy/agile dev
>> (sprints) that will be distributed to the EU, Universities, various
>> companies and other Open Source projects who have stated a clear interest
>>
>> in the PyPy showcase.....
>>
>> If you feel that answering this email doesnt really fit the purpose of
>> this mailinglist - please answer to me specifically.
>>
>> Thank you for your contribution!
>>
>> Cheers
>> Bea
>>
>>
>> Beatrice Düring			Change Maker
>> Tel: 031- 7750940		Järntorget 3
>> Mobil: 0734- 22 89 06		413 04 Göteborg
>> E-post: bea at changemaker.nu	www.changemaker.nu
>>
>> 	"Alla dessa måsten och alldaglighet.
>> 	Allt detta som binder vår verklighet
>> 	i bojor av skam och rep utav tvång.
>> 	Alla dessa kedjor som binder vår sång.
>> 	Jag skall slita dem alla i små, små stycken
>> 	och möjligtvis av resterna göra mig smycken."
>> 							- hemlig
>>
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>> _______________________________________________
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>

Beatrice Düring			Change Maker
Tel: 031- 7750940		Järntorget 3
Mobil: 0734- 22 89 06		413 04 Göteborg
E-post: bea at changemaker.nu	www.changemaker.nu

 	"Alla dessa måsten och alldaglighet.
 	Allt detta som binder vår verklighet
 	i bojor av skam och rep utav tvång.
 	Alla dessa kedjor som binder vår sång.
 	Jag skall slita dem alla i små, små stycken
 	och möjligtvis av resterna göra mig smycken."
 							- hemlig