A Metamodel-Based Approach for Customizing and Assessing Agile Methods

Abstract

In today's dynamic market environments, producing high quality software rapidly and efficiently is crucial. In order to allow fast and reliable development processes, several agile methodologies have been designed and are now quite popular. Although existing agile methodologies are abundant, companies are increasingly interested in the construction of their own customized methods to fit their specific environment. In this paper, we investigate how agile methods can be constructed in-house to address specific software process needs. First, we examine a case study focusing on the tailoring of two agile methodologies, XP and Scrum. Then, we focus on the high-level scope of any agile method customization and investigate an approach based on the Situational Method Engineering (SME) paradigm that includes measurement concepts for constructing context specific agile methodologies. We also examine several existing metamodels proposed for use in SME. Finally, we introduce an agile metamodel designed to support the construction of agile methods and relying on measurements to provide guidance to agile methodologists during the construction phase and throughout the development process itself.