Test Driven Development When Writing New Code

I have been doing TDD for several years now, and I can still not get around the recommendation to test first to the point where it breaks the code, write enough code to pass the test, and then go to the next test. In my experience this tends to work with mature code bases where there is a chunk of existing code that is being changed. However, I'm not sure this approach works for new applications that are being built from scratch. In my experience, a less purist approach seems to work for me:

• Write enough code to get something at least working minimally. If you think of a use case, I'm not sure there is much point in writing gobs of test cases before you even have a primary path through the use case. The XP methodology talks about an architectural or design spike, but in my experience there is also a coding spike. For example, it might be the first iteration that instead of writing code + tests we just write as much code as we can to push through the primary path as widely as possible instead of trying to be exhaustive in our testing.
  
• I use at least a basic unit test in NUnit as an entry point in all code debugging. That enforces the practice of having tests but also provides a useful way to gain entry into the code without web pages, windows forms, or a global main method. Using TestDriven.NET, you can simply right-click a test and run it right in studio using the debugger, NUnit, NCover, etc. and I find this higly efficient when writing new code.
  
• There does seem to be a drop off point where writing more and more tests provides less value, as in any testing effort. I'm seen some overly puritanical approaches to TDD where it was insisted that every boundary condition was to be coded up as a unit test no matter how unlikely the scenario or risk. In my experience there is a point where coding these scenarios is not worth the benefit of the test. In addition, I have found that in some cases it is still easier and better to manually test something than to try and code it up as a test.
  
• I definately like the idea of using build scripts and NUnit tests when making modifications to code. However, In my experience the tests actually don't change as much as the underlying code. In some cases there are new requirements but in many cases they are implementation changes. As long as the existing tests are still green after the change, then no new tests are required.
  
• There seems to be a trade-off between quick progress and the feeling of "being on a roll" and the pace of TDD which tends to be plodding but regular. Again, I think a less purist approach is best - at some points you feel your creative juices flowing and you want to plow through 2-3 pages of code in one go without writing exhaustive unit tests for each little method. Other times if you're being more cautious you want to test the living hell out of every line of code. As a mature developer, you have to feel the right pattern depending on the code you're writing.
  
• Lastly, I think its critical that at a minimum unit tests are written before code is checked into source control. That way if you have continuous integration the unit tests will run on every build. It seems also just a courtesy - you might have insight on why you left out some tests but your team mates might not. So before checking in code make sure there are tests to go with it. I find also that the unit tests are really a good description in code of the requirements so for new code its really helpful to have them as a guide.
  

For code changes in a larger mature application, I like the traditional TDD process of making new tests so that they fail, writing code to fix the tests and then regression. But for coding applications from scratch or starting a new major code project, I find a looser style tends to produce better results.

So with any agile technique, don't get to ideological about the approach - in my experience, TDD is best used as an approach and not a rigid perscription.

Example of Fat Code

Why exactly does the Google Toolbar need to be 47 megabytes?! It's a tool bar for heaven's sake...

Agile Tools for .NET Part 2

This is a follow up to my previous post on Agile Tools for .NET. I got to the office and I noticed a few more tools that I missed in my previous post.

Confluence

Atlassian's professional WIKI solution, it works great with JIRA and provides a really nice WIKI solution. For those who want to travel light with documentation, WIKI's provide a nice fit for technical documentation, build documentation, internal designs, etc. as they easily accomodate rapid changes, are completely web based and allow for automatic version tracking.

Data Dictionary Creator

One of the principles of Agile is make your code self-documenting. What about making your database self-documenting? You can do this in SQL 2005 in T-SQL by adding meta-data and descriptions to each field in your database. The Data Dictionary Creator tool does the same thing through a nice GUI and allows for export and import of the documentation. You can then document your database and store the meta-data in source safe for version control and safe keeping. In addition, you can export the descriptions to an excel file for instant documentation!

Wisdom Screen Hunter

Not really a development tool, but how many times have you been creating documents and wanted a quick screen capture? Forget using the PrntScrn and fiddling in paint - use this tool. Its free and allows you to capture any arbitrary rectangular area as well as any active window. Simply hit F6 and off you go.

Agile Tools for .NET

The following is a list of tools for doing agile based development with Microsoft .NET. There are quite a few tools out there that will accelerate your use of continuous integration, test driven development, source control integration, etc.

I have used all these tools - most I use on a daily basis. They are highly recommend and most are either low cost or free.

JIRA

Best tool for task management. For more details see my review of JIRA from a previous post. It's bugzilla on steroids and is much better and simpler than most windows based tools. It's java based, but there is still no reason not to use it for .NET based development.

NUNIT

NUnit is an implementation of the XUNIT framework for .NET. It allows you to create unit test classes that can be run by either a GUI or console application. NUnit will also integrate into your build process so that on each build, you run through your automated tests to make sure they still pass.

NANT

NANT is a port of the ANT build tool from Java. NANT allows for build scripts based on simple XML files. NANT can do things such as compile code, deploy assemblies, manage directories, start and stop processes, run executables, etc.

NCover

NCover is a code coverage tool for .NET. It will instrument your assemblies when they are built to analyze each line of code in your assembly and whether it was actually executed (exercised). If you combine this with NUnit, you can then tell how much your unit tests actually go through every path of code.

dotTrace or Ants Profiler

Either tool will do, but personally I like Ants Profiler better and you can get it as a bundle with Ants Loader for cheaper. Both tools do the same thing - they profile either memory or performance data for your executing code. You can profile an ASP.NET web site, a Winform application or a Windows Service. What you will get in the case of memory profiling is the ability to snapshot at any point of execution a picture of what is in memory. This can help with objects not getting garbage collected properly or where you're running into memory issues. For performance profiling, the tool will tell you the amount of time each line of code took to execute. This can be useful for performance testing in that you can see the breakdown of time for a method to isolate the particular lines of code that are taking the longest.

Cruise Control .NET

Cruise Control is a port of the java application of the same name. It is a continuous integration server which will fire a build on every check into your source code repository. It can run either a NANT script or an MSBuild script or simply tell Visual Studio 2005 to do a build. It then stores the status of each build in a little intranet site that you can monitor and it can email you notifications as well. This provides an automated way to integrate code and test to make sure it builds and passes all your unit tests.

My Generation

My Generation is a code generator. It ships with a number of templates for generating O/R mapping code for frameworks such as Gentle, NHibernate, DAAB, etc.

TestDriven .NET

This is one of my favourite tools. It allows you to integrate your unit testing right into studio. Want to run one of your NUnit Tests? Just right click on the test code and up comes a Run with option that you can then run with the debugger, NCover, NUnit, etc. The one I use most is run with Debugger as it means you can step through the code hit by each of your unit tests.

ANKH

Ankh is a subversion add-in for Visual Studio 2005. For those who are using subversion as your source code control system (and I would recommend subversion in general over Visual Source Safe) it allows you to update and commit code from the solution explorer window. My only problem with this tool is that its quite slow especially if you have large projects, so you may find it easier to check in with external tools after a while. But for those who are just getting used to subversion, its a great first step.

Getting to the Finish Line in an Agile Project

One of the great potentials of Agile software development is flexibility in changing requirements. We currently use agile methodologies and have scheduled 2 week iterations. We have show and tells with stakeholders every two weeks where we show them where things are at and gather new user stories, functionality changes and other feedback to plan for the next iteration.

One of the challenges we have found with this approach is that the project quickly turns into perpetual development. One of the advantages of a traditional waterfall model is a solid arc in development and a very specific deliverable - you have a good definition of when you're done. In an environment where the requirements evolve, the time lines are fluid and the stakeholders are not that experienced at software projects we are finding that this means that the project never seems to end! Every two week iteration, stakeholders simply pile on new requirements and the launch date drifts away.

In a consulting environment, this isn't such a bad thing if you're on a time and materials engagement - the client simply gets to spend their money as long as they want. But in an internal development team, this poses a challenge because most stakeholders aren't really aware of how much money they are spending and they simply keep monopolizing the team. In the meantime, there are other projects or priorities queueing up in the background.

Based on what we have found works, here are some practical recommendations on how to combat this problem:

• Establish clear business objectives and as many solid functional requirements as possible. There is a happy medium between XP style iterative programming and a rigid waterfall model. Try to put some acceptance criteria that can be measured so that the entire team has a common understanding of the target.
• Remember the law of triple constraints - of cost, resources, and time changing any of these impacts the others. Make sure that stakeholders are aware of the real cost (even if it is an internal cost) through an internal budgeting model. In our organization, we have a shared cost model in IT but we can allocated the shared cost to any department we choose. In cases where we see departments monopolizing our time we can allocate more cost to them. This gives internal stakeholders an incentive to prioritize and conserve resources.
• Make stakeholders compete with each other. This is pure politics but it works. The easiest way to stop a project is to simply tell another stakeholder that they're waiting in the queue behind someone else. There will be a pretty quick meeting between stakeholders where one will start to put a lot of pressure on the other to get their project done quickly or to get out of line altogether.
• Time box and resource constraint the project explicitly. We do this quite a bit with reporting needs which seem to continually evolve ad nauseum. When we start these types of projects, we establish a budget of 2-3 iterations and that's the budget. The requirements can evolve but there continues to be pressure on the stakeholder to get it right the first time or else lose their window.
• Always have a phased approach with Phase 2 and 3 already planned in Phase 1. This gives the stakeholder the ability to still feel they're going to get a change at some point but perhaps can live with launching without it.
• Be vigilant and communicate often about what's currently in and out of scope. I'm not sure whether stakeholders intentionally play dumb or whether people simply don't hear bad news but I've experienced several times the case where three meetings in a row we hear questions about a feature that we've already ruled out of scope and there is genuine surprise from the stakeholder that they're not getting a particular feature even if its been already discussed, documented, etc.
• Have really strong leaders in QA. QA Leads, especially in the latter stages of projects, become crucial at communicating and organizing priorities. A great QA Lead can manage stakeholders on a daily bug review meeting and can handle the constant re-negotiation of last minute feature requests, low priority bug fixes, etc. and keep the process moving towards launch. If the project loses velocity during the stage it opens the door to ever increasing scope change. If the project has high velocity then everyone on the team feels like they better prioritize because time is running out and the project is going to launch without them. This helps crystallize priorities and puts good pressure on stakeholders to commit to the minimum work required to launch.

I've been in projects where we sat at 90% for 5 months because we kept stalling as we closed in on the finish line. In addition, I've been on projects with internal teams where the stakeholders simply got used to having a software team at their disposal week after week and their was never any pressure to launch anything or to stop working.

As a project manager, your goal is to launch - 90% complete is really 0% complete especially if it's still just running in development or still buggy in test.

Can You Trust Second Life Charity?

At the foundation, we are interested in Second Life. For those who are not familiar, Second Life is a virtual 3D world that allows for users to create custom content, communicate with others in a virtual world and buy and sell items in a virtual currency. What makes it unique is that the virtual currency can be converted into real cash, allow for the conversion between the virtual and the real.

Commercial activities have evolved over the past year or so in Second Life to include things like virtual real estate, virtual products, etc. In the past little while, charities have started doing virtual fundraising by having virtual walkathons, virtual campaigns, etc. in Second Life. The virtual currency they raise they then convert to real dollars to help real people.

So here is the basic question - how do you ensure a trusted conversion between the fantasy and the real? In the case where a Second Life user is buying a virtual good, then there is no real issue - they pay virtual money and instantly get a virtual hat, a virtual house, etc. But if you donate virtual money to a virtual charity, how do you know that its really going to the charity? This is true for commercial conversions as well, e.g. if you pay in virtual currency for a physical good, how do ensure that the vendor is legitimate?

The number one objective for a fundraiser is raising money for their respective cause. But a very close number two is ensuring the maintenance of its brand, reputation and trust with its donors. Its critically important because its the only long term asset a fundraiser has at their disposal (in the same way as Nike, Sony, or Coca Cola).

There are a couple potential ways you can verify that a charity asking for money is legitimate and sanctioned:

• Check the charities web site. For example, the American Cancer Society publicizes its Second Life Relay for Life and provides instructions on how to get involved.
  
• Call the charity. If the person asking for money is legitimate, they'll be registered in some way as an event organizer.
  
• Ask the person in Second Life basic questions like: do you have a contact I can talk to, how do I verify that you work for the charity, do you have a tax number, etc. The person should have a way to give you information that can be verified - at least that shows the person has some basic knowledge of the charity they are promoting.

There are some people in Second Life who may be asking for donations and legitimately giving the money to a charity. However, without some way to verify it I would suggest you're better off donating directly to the charity.

If you cannot verify, I would not donate a single L$ as you have no way to ensure the money is actually going to charity.

Creative use of Delegates in .NET

I normally don't use delegates, since I don't do a lot of events programming where they are commonly used. But I was building a class library the other day and found a good use for them.

Here is the scenario: I have a series of methods that allow for merging of records in our main CRM. In order to connect to the CRM, there is a series of setup and tear down calls that have to be made such as connecting, logging in, etc.

So I found myself creating a dozen methods that all looked something like this:

public void mergeAddress(String masterID, String mergeID)
{
try
{
bunch of set up code
meat of the method
bunch of tear down code
}
catch (Exception e)
{
throw new MergeException("Unexpected error in method mergeAddress", e);
}
}

I found myself copying and pasting this chunk of code over and over again, which is always a good sign that some refactoring is required.

My solution was to use a delegate to represent the meat of the method in the middle. Therefore, instead of having a bunch of methods that repeat the same code over and over again, I can now rewrite the method to look something like this:

protected delegate void mergeDelegate(String MasterID, String MergeID);

public void mergeByDelegate(del method, String MasterID, String MergeID)
{
try
{
bunch of set up code
del.invoke();
bunch of tear down code
}
catch (Exception e)
{
throw new MergeException("Unexpected error in method mergeAddress", e);
}

}

Now the method becomes like a prototype - I can keep the set up and tear down in one place and simply sub in the method call in the middle.

(FYI, You could do the same thing by splitting the method into three chunks, moving them into a class and sub-classing the method in the middle, but I think using a simple delegate is easier.)

To implement the prototype now looks something like this:

public void mergeAddress(String MasterID, String MergeID)
{
mergeDelegate del = this.mergeAddress();
mergeByDelegate(del, MasterID, String MergeID);
}

public void mergeAddress(String MasterID, String MergeID)
{
meat of the method
}

All the set up and tear down code is now centralized into one method. The part that changes in the middle can now vary in a variety of ways.

Hope this helps everyone with another way of using delegates...I've always struggled to find a use for them.

Low Tech Approaches to Powerpoint Presentations

Take a look at these videos as a low tech presentation format. Think about how you can use these techniques for selling ideas, explaining technical concepts, brainstorming, etc. For more ideas on low-tech requirements gathering, see my previous post as well.

LiveEarth not in the top 10?!

Whoever organized LiveEarth really missed the blogosphere. A few points of evidence:

1. There are only 2049 blog posts on LiveEarth?
2. LiveEarth as a search term isn't hitting the Technorati top 10.
3. The LiveEarth facebook group only has 678 members.

Whoever is responsible for creating Buzz on the blogsophere for LiveEarth is doing a poor job - Paris Hilton and the IPhone are doing much better than LiveEarth, a supposedly global change event.

I'm going back to enjoying the music on the old fashion technology called the Television! :)

Problems with Live Earth Broadcast

Compared to the Live8 broadcast that AOL did, the LiveEarth broadcast is a disappointment. The resolution of the video is significantly poorer and yet I'm finding that the stream is having a lot of problems handling the load. There are a lot of blackouts, frequent rebuffering of content and there have already been complaints that the site only works in Internet Explorer.

This could have been a fantastic showcase for Silverlight - with the quick download of the plugin Microsoft could have showcased its new technology including some fantastic video streaming.

But instead we see choppy video, disconnected audio and very slow response rate on the interface.

What a missed opportunity!

Creating a Single Sign-On Solution for .NET Part 2

For the past couple days I've been building my single sign-on solution based on my previously posted design.

I built some simple web services that allow for login against a membership profile database using the supplied ASP.NET membership architecture. By registering the membership and logging in, we can provide a token that can be used to represent the logged in user. This token can then be distributed on the URL and passed to partner sites. The partner site can the validate the token and retrieve the membership information through a web service method.

Here is the code:

using System;
using System.Data;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.Caching;
using System.Web.Security;
using System.Collections;
using System.Web.Services;
using System.Web.Services.Protocols;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Web.Profile;
using System.Configuration;
using System.Security.Principal;

namespace SingleSignOn.WebService
{

[WebService(Namespace = "http://localhost/")]
[WebServiceBinding(ConformsTo = WsiProfiles.BasicProfile1_1)]
[ToolboxItem(false)]
public class MemberWebService : System.Web.Services.WebService
{
///

/// Logs in a user and provides back a token. Tokens can then be used to regrab the profile data.
///

///
///
///
[WebMethod]
public string registerMember(string userName, string password)
{
if (Membership.ValidateUser(userName, password))
{
Guid token = Guid.NewGuid();
HttpContext.Current.Cache.Insert(token.ToString(), userName, null, Cache.NoAbsoluteExpiration, TimeSpan.FromMinutes(20));
return token.ToString();
}
else
return null;
}

///

/// Validates a token and provides back a membership user in return. If the member isn't found then null is returned.
///

/// Token to validate.
/// MembershipUser object for the mapped user. If token isn't found then null is returned.
[WebMethod]
public MembershipUser validateMember(string token)
{
string userName = (string) HttpContext.Current.Cache[token];
MembershipUser member = Membership.GetUser(userName);
return member;
}

///

/// Returns the current profile object.
///

/// Token to map to a currently logged in user.
/// Array of name value pairs.
[WebMethod]
public object[][] getProfile(string token)
{
string userName = (string)HttpContext.Current.Cache[token];
Hashtable profileHash = new Hashtable();
ProfileBase profile = WebProfile.Create(userName, true);
foreach (SettingsProperty property in WebProfile.Properties)
{
profileHash.Add(property.Name, profile[property.Name]);
}
return toJaggedArray(profileHash);
}

///

/// This doesn't work. I have not yet found a way to update profiles properly in ASP.NET.
///

///
///
///
[WebMethod]
public void updateProfileProperty(string token, string propertyName, string value)
{
try
{
}
catch (Exception e)
{
System.Diagnostics.Debug.Print(e.Message);
}
}

///

/// Invalidate the cache entry containing the token.
///

/// Token representing user
[WebMethod]
public void logout(string token)
{
HttpContext.Current.Cache.Remove(token);
}

private object[][] toJaggedArray(Hashtable ht)
{
object[][] oo = new object[ht.Count][];
int i = 0;
foreach (object key in ht.Keys)
{
oo[i] = new object[] { key, ht[key] };
i++;
}
return oo;
}

private Hashtable toHashtable(object[][] oo)
{
Hashtable ht = new Hashtable(oo.Length);
foreach (object[] pair in oo)
{
object key = pair[0];
object value = pair[1];
ht[key] = value;
}
return ht;
}
}
}


One small technical note - because web services don't support Hashtables, you need to convert these to a more basic array in order to return them. See the getProfile method as an example.

There is one fundamental problem - trying to manage other people's profiles. It seems that the ASP.NET profile management is based on the assumption that you are reading and writing a current logged in user's profile context. However, in this case, we want to be able to proxy the profile data out to the world which means being able to read and write any user's profile data. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to do this in the current profile architecture. You can get a Profile object from the HttpContext, but this is the current logged in user. You can use the ProfileManager class to grab profile objects but it doesn't provide you access to individual properties of the profile. You can load up a profile object using the GetProfile method, but then there is no way to save the profile.

So it seems that if I'm going to use a distributed global profile management system, I'm going to have to build my own. This isn't really a huge problem as the built in profile management system is fairly weak (see my previous post on general problems with the ASP.NET profile) and building a basic profile management system to store name value pairs or serialized objects isn't that difficult.

But the good news is the basic idea of proxying a token across a domain to store a logged in user seems to work in principle. The next challenge is figuring out the best way to secure it so that only valid partner sites can use the service.

Creating a Single Sign-On Solution for .NET

We have a basic single sign-on requirement. We need to be able to allow users to login and pass that login to other distributed systems.

Here are the basic requirements:

1. We want to control the master user profile so that we can have access to the data and integrate it into our offline CRM systems.

2. We have a number of partners who provide hosted applications for us that require authentication. We need to provide a mechanism to have a single sign-on for users that can then be passed to to these partners.

3. The partners may have their own profile requirements that are independent of our needs. For example, let's assume we have a partner that provides community forums and saves the user's favourite forums in their profile. Only the partner cares about this information and centralizing it doesn't add any real value.

4. The solution has to work in a distributed, multi-platform environment. The only access to and from the partners and us is through port 80 using either REST or Web Services calls.

5. The domain may not be the same and therefore you cannot share cookies (see http://www.codeproject.com/aspnet/aspnetsinglesignon.asp and www.411asp.net/func/goto?id=5998410 for a solution based on the assumption that you can simply poke the cookie created by ASP.NET)

6. There needs to be a way to transfer state from one server to another in cases where the user is logged in already. If user logs in Site A and then goes to Site B, they should appear to be still logged in.

So here is the basic design:



1. User logs in by calling a login web service method (see this example for a web services method implementation of login). User is now authenticated on the main site.
2. User links to partner site which passes a token representation of the state (we could use the SessionID itself in .NET as a token).
3. The partner site receives the token and calls a ValidateToken web service method. This validates the passed in token and provides back the membership information for the current user.
4. If the partner site collects user information, the site can call the Update web service method to update the master profile.
5. If the user wants to link back from the partner site to the main site, the partner site provides a link back to the main site with the token embedded in the query string.
6. The main site receives the token and calls a ValidateToken web service method. This validates the passed in token and provides back the membership information for the current user.

This basic architecture should work with a couple basic caveats:

1. State needs to be managed centrally with the usual challenges of managing session state in a load balanced environment.
2. There needs to be some security around the token validation service to prevent malicious sites from getting access to the service. There are lots of solutions for this including putting the web services under VPN, including a site authentication mechanism in the web service method, filtering by IP, etc.
3. Each link needs to be dynamically re-written to include the token. If there are lots of existing cross-over points then this could be a challenge.
4. The parsing of the token needs to happen on every page request. In .NET this could be done using an HTTP Module as a central parsing code. Alternatively, you could have a redirect page that all pages link to first with the original target url embedded in a query parameter (this is how typical login pages work for example).
5. There needs to be some mechanism for keeping the state alive so that it doesn't time out. This could again done using an HTTP Module that on every page request does a web service request to validate token to simply keep the state alive.
6. The solution assumes that there is a single backing master profile that distributes profile information. A "peer to peer" type model could be developed but it would be more complicated.

From a look and feel perspective, the solution doesn't require a single login or registration experience but it probably would make sense. Keep the login and registration forms on the main web site and have them redirect back to the partner site if the request is coming from the partner.

Implementing an Agile Change Control Process

What is Change Control?

Change Control traditionally is a project management process for managing change. The typical method for managing change in a classic PMP project is a Change Control form that is filled out containing the scope of the change, impact to the project, etc. This is then approved and incorporated into the master project plan, charter, etc.



In addition, Change Control processes are used by operations departments to manage the deployment and promotion of code from one environment to another. The Change Control Form provides the documentation for an operations team to deploy, operate and monitor the change.

Change Control and Agile

This traditional view of Change Control is at odds with Agile methodologies for the following reasons:

1. Change is viewed as a non-typical event, e.g. the project was running smoothly until someone threw a change into the project. Agile projects by definition are based on the assumption that changes are typical events and aren't special.

2. Change requests are simply Waterfall designs in miniature. Requirements for the change must be documented up front and analyzed. Stakeholders must approve of changes before they are made with the assumption that requirements, scope, risk, and design can be formally documented ahead of making a code change.

3. Traditional Change Control processes are document heavy. The process is designed as much to capture and document change as it is to make effective decisions. Change control forms are kept around forever with dates and identifiers so that someone could find out who approved a change. In many cases, these are also printed out, resulting in very large binders of paper with signatures for every change.

4. In an agile project, one of the objectives is to flatten the team and reduce hierarchies so that people can more effectively communicate. However, traditional change control processes require specialized knowledge, special powers of approval and a hierarchical command and control structure. Project Managers are usually the writers of change control forms, but then they must get approval from "Stakeholders" who will bless the change.

Here is a good example of a traditional Change Control process - have a look at Bell South's Change Control Process Guide. At 120 pages, it is a great example of how bloated a large formal change control process can get when Project Managers are working in a bureaucratic environment. Just managing the process documentation alone takes a massive investment - just look at the 20 pages of version numbers of this document and you'll see that someone's full-time job must be simply keeping the guide up to date!

Change Control isn't a bad thing - the original objectives behind formal Change Control are actually in line with the objectives of agile methodologies:

1. Define change and anticipate change early instead of leaving it to the end.
2. Providing a process for incorporating change during development of a project.
3. Communicate scope, risks and impacts of a change.
4. Provide the appropriate review and approval process to authorize a change.

It isn't that change control is bad - it's that the evolution of formal project methodologies has led to very bureaucratic, documentation heavy processes. In addition, keep in mind that most of these processes were invented before the incorporation of digital collaboration tools such as email, Wikis, sharepoint, JIRA, Word, etc. and so the typical change control process has artifacts from a non-digital era.

Implementing an Agile Change Control Process

Change Control can be used effectively in an Agile environment if it is sufficiently light weight, non-bureaucratic and collaborative. Here are my recommendations based on what I have seen work effectively on Agile and non-Agile projects:

1. Use an agile methodology such as XP, Crystal, Scrum, etc. that has change management built into its fundamental process. In Scrum, for example, all work is effectively a change and is logged as a "change request" in a work backlog. In XP the changes are logged as User Stories. Iterations allow for changes to happen on a regular basis - they're not special change events.

2. Use a generic task tracking system such as JIRA to log any change. In JIRA, you don't need a separate "bug tracking" system that is different than your change tracking system. In addition, you can take a change all the way from requirements to deployment without re-entering information. You could do the same thing with low tech tools such as Excel or Word simply by having a work log that is updated regularly.

3. If you have specific legal or regulatory reasons to track changes then try to understand the specific minimum requirements. I've worked in a government environment for example where all changes needed to be documented so that they could be audited. But the level of detail that was incorporated into each Change Control form became ridiculous - an auditor probably doesn't really need to see a change in an individual SQL script, a deployment checklist that includes changing ODBC connection strings, etc.!

4. Eliminate as many approvals as possible. We had a change control form that had 10 signatures on it - I was one of them! I used to get these forms across my desk documenting some change to an application that I had never even seen, had no idea how to measure the risk of the change and yet I was expected to "approve" it. Even worse, the signature had to be on paper so there was a constant stream of people running around with pieces of paper trying to find me to get my signature. Eliminate all this process and identify the minimum number of people who need to be involved in any change.

5. If you're going to have a Change Control Form/Process, keep in as light as possible. Your form should be no more than 2 pages and should be as automated as possible. We currently use JIRA to automate all our tickets. In previous environments, we've used Outlook forms. I've also seen this done use Word with Macros enabled to provide drop downs, automatic fill-in, etc. Keep your process light as well - if you need 2 hours of training to teach someone how to make a code change, then something is wrong!

6. Keep Operations teams involved from day one. One of the primary reasons why change control forms are deployed is because Operations teams get tired of having code dumped on them without documentation or involvement. The typical solution is to put in a gate keeping process to keep the developers from deploying something unsafe to production. This is a legitimate role, but change control processes typically provide artificial security - simply because a developer has filled in the proper form doesn't mean their code works as advertised. Instead, have an Operations Lead that is an integral part of the project from day one who will have a specific understanding of the project and create the right level of documentation, deployment guides, test cases, etc. and be testing these along the way. This is far more effective than a large form being written at the end of the cycle.

7. Keep stakeholders involved throughout the project. The reason why Change Control forms need to be so heavily documented is because the key stakeholders have not been involved all along the way. If stakeholders are seeing working software using Show and Tell techniques, then Change Control simply becomes regular involvement in the project.

8. Use multiple models of communication. Instead of having a single Change Control Form that forces people to write in a specific way, allow for multiple models of communication that could include meetings, power point presentations, white boards, Visio diagrams, etc.

Based on the above principles, here is my current favorite flavour of Change Control:

1. We build our requirements using use case documents that living documents. We currently use Word because its dumb simple and stakeholders can easily open it and change it. We use power point for wire frames and Visio for almost everything else.

2. Revisions of documents get stored in source code control for safe keeping and history. However, we're not dogmatic about it and in my experience the value of these minor revisions is usually not significant - most stakeholders want to see the current version. We keep them in our repository so that everything is stored together and document revisions are tied to code revisions.

3. We have iterations every 2 weeks that include review meetings with the entire team including stakeholders. We do a show and tell of all working code and we use the meeting to prioritize and change. We typically do this by opening up documents on the spot, but sometimes we use pen and paper and transcribe the changes right after the meeting.

4. We use JIRA for day to day tracking of tasks. We treat all changes, bugs, feature requests and tickets the same way. We have a very simple work flow that moves all tasks from open to resolved to closed. Our list of changes can be pulled directly from JIRA as a list of changes. The list of outstanding bugs can be also pulled at any time so we don't need a specific final bug review meeting - we will have been reviewing them on a daily basis.

5. When we're getting close to deployment, we use white board based checklists to capture the minute details (e.g. make sure the ODBC driver is configured properly) that need to be done to move to production. We check these off by simply crossing them off or wiping them from the list. We have 15-20 minute stand-up meetings that includes the Operations Lead so that we're communicating effectively with Operations and they know exactly where things are at as we move into production.

6. Just before doing a deployment to production, I have a meeting with executive stakeholders with a very high level presentation in power point. It presents the current status, any risks that they need to understand, confidence in going, and high level operations plan. Executives typically don't care about whether the SQL is right - they want to know that the team has confidence that it can deploy safely, has followed the appropriate testing processes and that the team is on standby with a contingency plan in case things go wrong.

There are lots of variations to this process and many different tool combinations. You can scale the process up or down depending on the size and formality of the project. In addition, if you're working in a specific regulatory context you may need to be producing more formal documents, approvals, audit trails, etc. My suggestion is always prioritize these below communication and if you need to do this for regulatory purposes then do so but keep the work as minimized as possible. Never substitute change control processes for good communication, team collaboration, stakeholder involvement, etc. In addition, remember that Change Control is a means and not an end - working software is the objective and should be focus for the team.