Comments on: APR: Nexus Alpha Release Announcement

By: Scott Sehlhorst

Scott Sehlhorst — Sun, 20 May 2007 11:22:42 +0000

Thanks Roger. Although I only mentioned it briefly, I did get an early pre-alpha to a few people (the site was functional at a different URL before it became nexus, around build 65). I also was able to get feedback in person from folks who saw a prototype on my laptop. I didn’t share those early versions more broadly because I felt they might dissuade end users. The alpha was the first “complete enough” version to share with people indiscriminately.

It is a challenge to balance the perception of “incomplete products” that comes from early releases to the wrong people with the need to get feedback on early releases.

By: Roger L. Cauvin

Roger L. Cauvin — Fri, 18 May 2007 23:08:56 +0000

I join Rolf in congratulating you on putting together a neat site so quickly.

I would go further than Rolf in questioning the “agileness” of the approach, however. It seems to have been a waterfall process despite the short amount of time it took to get the basic site up and running.

An example of “true” agile process would have been one that resulted in a first “release” that was completely hardwired – e.g. one or more use cases implemented as a sequence of static web pages. Such a release would enable you to exercise the requirements and interaction design risks – and obtain feedback about the requirements and usability from users of a “working” system – in a fraction of the time.

I list some approaches to iterating here.

By: Scott Sehlhorst

Scott Sehlhorst — Fri, 18 May 2007 16:04:10 +0000

Hey Rolf, first – thanks for the help on the project, I’m looking forward to more as we go. Second – thanks for the spot-on critique of the “bonus features.”

I just typed a really long response, and then decided to make it into today’s article. Thanks again, and check out the next article for this ongoing discussion.

By: Rolf

Rolf — Fri, 18 May 2007 13:13:27 +0000

First of all: congratulations, Scott. I think you’ve done a lot of high quality work during the last month. I’m happy to be a part of it.

However, allow me to comment on the agile project experiment (no offense intended !).
For me, in an agile project there’s no room for “Bonus Features –
a couple other things implemented early while we were there”. I’d like to see us come back to the original idea of prioritization (which can mean a change of priorities with the help of the users).

All new ideas or things we stumble upon should undergo the same persona/usecase/priorities analysis as the original ideas did. Otherwise this project leans over to hacking. (However, I respect your dictator role, Scott.) This should be done for the purpose of the experiment reader’s (and my) education and their chance of gaining insight. I know that it is easier to skip these things, but that is not what we are preaching in agile/lean product development classes/articles/books.

On the other hand, can the “change of plan” be interpreted as an experience with agile projects? Can we deduct that it is more important to have a strong product manager than to have a clear process for transforming ideas into products? (or even further, that projects should be created so, that a product manager can implement his own vision ;-)
This would be very interesting knowledge I gain from the experiment.

I’d love to know what YOU are thinking about the project’s process. Why did we deviate?