This forum provides a place for those working to better the software
development profession (and other development communities), to share
ideas, and keep up with trends. I know that we are all working hard to
understand and make the changes necessary to take pride in our work
and have our customers love to work with us. In this light, I was
recently pointed to the following article from Randy Miller:

http://www.stsc.hill.af.mil/crosstalk/2005/12/0512Miller.html

If Randy had discussed MSF VSTS Agile and the contents of this article
with us prior to publication, we perhaps could have helped him and
Microsoft avoid this mistake. Perhaps we will have to work a little
harder to correct the impression he may have given others that Scrum
and Agile aren't that hard, just a little twist. What saddens me most
is that there is a community of developers within Microsoft who are
trying to make better the profession and Microsoft's software; this
will make their lives even harder. Regardless, we move forward with
our work.

I'm fascinated that Randy writes, "MSF for Agile Software Development
is composed of a set of proven practices commonly used to build
software at Microsoft." when VSTS is already over a year late.

I attended a Microsoft presentation by Randy's people on this subject
where they announced that they were working on a process that "would
take Agile to the next level." I commented at the time that Scrum and
Agile were barely processes, more techniques for making change within
the development and wider organization. This change is very similar to
what any organization encounters when using lean techniques, and the
implementation process takes years.

I knew that there would be those who would not get Agile and Scrum.
However this type of marketing and facile representation of what we do
is very disappointing. Yet, watch for more of the same as IBM (with
their recent donation of parts of RUP and documentation of Scrum) gets
into this through the Eclipse foundation and Microsoft gets into this
with VSTS. One has to wonder at the mismatch between large,
hierarchical, command and control organizations providing guidance on
Agile.

I recently declined an invitation from Microsoft to "modify Scrum to
fit Microsoft Project." The list goes on.

Take heart in knowing that what we are doing is right and very important.

Regards,
Ken