Over recent years, Agile development and Scrum have been championed by some developers, and various consulting firms, with a quasi-religious fervour. Initially, I was sceptical but Scrum has taken hold among the Red Gate development and testing teams and, as I started to witness their “daily scrum downs”, I was moved to act. Why should Simple-Talk be left out? Dismissed as the couch potatoes of the new Agile World? In no time, I had persuaded the Simple-Talk team to form a Scrum and get ready for the next newsletter sprint
| Scrum Master | So come on team, where’s the SQL server indexing article? |
| Andrew | I passed that ball onto Tony 2 days ago. He stuffed it down the back of his jersey and I’ve not seen it since. |
| Scrum Master | Ok Flyboy Davis, so what have you done since yesterday on this ‘product backlog’ item? |
| Tony | Well, Andrew undercooked the pass a bit I’m afraid. I’ve moved pages 1 to 4 on to the flankers for a copy edit but still need to finish juggling pages 5 and 6. |
| Scrum Master | OK then, what about the LINQ-to-SQL piece? Have you achieved your sprint goal? |
| Tony | Well it’s done, if that’s what you mean. |
| Andrew | DONE?! It’s a lot more than done. I finished the technical edit yesterday. That article is DONE-done. |
| Production gaffer: | If it’s DONE-done, why don’t I have it for the newsletter? |
| Tony | Well, unfortunately, Microsoft has suddenly had a bit of a “change of heart” on this particular technology. We’ll have to put it on the burn down chart, I’m afraid. |
| Scrum Master | No, no! This is just normal ‘Requirements Churn’. An agile team must think on their feet and adapt! Why don’t we chuck this ball to our fleet-footed winger, Phil Factor, and let him run with it? |
| Tony | Well, if you insist, but I think you’ll find that he’ll just try to sell you a dummy and end up impaling himself on the corner flag. |
| Scrum Master | Ok, OK, people, let’s try and prevent a complete scrum collapse here. |
| Production gaffer: | Cluck! Cluck! Cluck! |
OK, so maybe for publishing, a “maul” is more appropriate than a Scrum. And not just any maul but a proper rolling maul, with boots, fists, shouting for blood subs and orange wedges, making agonising, inch-by-inch progress towards the greasy touchline; Phil Factor at the centre of it, holding fiercely onto the ball and Richard Morris blowing madly on his shiny Acme whistle.
And at the end of the match, a total of 15 tries, but just the one conversion.
Cheers!
Tony.
Load comments