Looking for a tool to use Scrum

Hi,

May be you can try with

http://www.pivotaltracker.com/

I know it's a bit mercenary, but one thing to consider is the marketability of the experience you get with the tool. If the project does not align to any particular solution, why not choose one that will best improve the employment prospects of team members?

When you develop skills with a product, that is an investment and it's reasonable to think about the potential return.

Hello Shweta,

I'd recommend to have a look at IceScrum: http://www.icescrum.org/en/

Kind regards,

Are there any reasons not to use a physical board? I would always suggest/advice a physical board over a digital one because I like the team engagement that comes with it.

I agree with Chee-Hong. Although online tools are ubiquitous and sometimes useful I consider them a necessary evil. No tool can provide the visibility, impact and ease-of-use that a physical board does. That said, a simple spreadsheet, kept up-to-date, will suffice when an online capability is needed.

Scrumwise is a good tool

http://www.agiledistributed.com/

I advise many teams to use Team Foundation Service [ http://tfs.visualstudio.com ]. The terms used in TFS is aligned with Scrum Guide.

The topic is about free tools if im not mistaken

As the agile manifesto says, "Individuals and interactions over processes and tools". If you focus on the tool before you start implementing scrum, the tool will dictate the practices. I would rather let the practices that are optimal for my team evolve. My advice is don't get caught up on the tool. Use a physical board, post-its, spreadsheets, (whatever works). Instead, focus on the people and scrum/agile principles. The tool will fall in place when you feel a need.

As for me, a spreadsheet has worked just fine. I use google docs to share it with the team. But, honestly, if my workplace had a board that was visible to everyone, I would have used that instead. OTOH, the neat thing about a spreadsheet (as opposed to a formal tool) is that you can "customize" it. For example, in the current sprint, I had way too many stories spilled over from the previous one and needed to highlight it. I just colored them red, and didn't even have to explain why in my daily scrum!

Hi Shweta,

I agree with Chee-Hong, Vasan and anyone which suggests a physical board. I started with a physical board and it is easier for people to be participatory, active and work together. After a whiel, team members change their localization being distributed and I had to use a tool. In addition, managers required reports and so often I had to rewrite tasks or wasting time on bureaucracy. If you can go straight to what is important, a place visible to all, where the team is active.

If external agents push you to a tool and since you asked I have two proposals:

Kunagi
IceScrum

If external agents push you to a tool and since you asked I have two proposals:

Kunagi
IceScrum

I would recommend to work with physical board if possible, too.
But my team had to work with shared team IN france, India and Romania and now Morocco, then we decided to use an online tool, not to use excel sheets. In fact the Scrum Master were happy, because they were freed from manually update charts :-)
We use KADOS since almots one year and all users are happy : Scrum Master, Team Members and since a few weeks, some Product Owners are keen to use the Tool instead of their own excel or big editor soft.

KADOS is open-source and totally free of charge. You just need an Apache/PHP server (PHP 5.3 at least, we used a 5.1 to start without looking at the install instructions and had a few bugs :-) ) and a Mysql server.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/kados/
http://www.kados.info/en/

Hi guys,

I've been using scrum for more than 2 years now and I would also recommend physical board. However in my new office (actually this is my first day in my new job! :) ) physical conditions are not quite suitable for this. This is an open office that is surrounded with glass walls that are not large enough. And if I close one of those walls with my board, it wont look nice. But maybe I'll do it in the future.

As a result of short research, I also found iceScrum which seems nice.
To the ones who have used this tool,
1- Do I need to integrate this tool with other task management tools such as jira Or will I be able to do my task management from here?
2- Does this have an intergration with source safe? It would be nice to commit a code and link it to a scrum task.

Thanks a lot

Btw, I've just noticed that iceScrum on cloud is not free! :(

I need such an online tool that my team can access. I don't want to host its .war file or make everyone install it on their PCs

yep, kados seems good. I wish it was on the cloud though. I'll give it a try.

Yes, a full-edition opensource tool free in the cloud ! I think it's not easy to find ! :-)
It may happens but most of the time it has not all useful functions and you have to pay for them.

You may suggest that to the Kados team. Since they develop a quite complete software for nothing, maybe they will be philanthropists and create a free cloud offer with all features. :-)

What about this guys? I've tried it and have to admit I'm loving it - http://reqtest.com/features/agile-board/

Hey, I think ZenTao is best scrum tool ZenTao Project Management Software is based on Scrum has more features with cheaper price.

I don't like going down the "tools" path. Often times, sending a e-mail or setting up a scrum board in Excel Online is easier than teaching people to use a tool and then finding somebody to maintain and support the new tool.

ZenTao is cool, worth a trial.

Totally support Mark Adams.

When we started with Scrum, we set up two Excel Sheets, one for the PBL, one for the SBL, in which every Sprint got an own tab. Both backlogs had all attributes we needed back then and when we saw the need to change the way of working or missed something, it was added to the backlog. So the "tool" grew whenever we needed it to grow.

In our program we have two Scrum Teams for two products. The other had issues and will now switch to JIRA (available as standard tool in our organization), but I doubt the issues were tool-related. I asked my team if they wanted to switch and they were like "well, new tool, would need to get used to, it will be slower in usage than Excel, does not support everything we have in Excel..."

There are multiple solutions you can use. Whatever you choose, discuss it with the complete Scrum Team, have them have a look at the alternatives and then vote what to use.

Several tools stand out as highly effective for Agile project management:

1. Jira Software: A popular choice among Agile teams, Jira offers robust features for Scrum, Kanban, and other Agile methodologies. It provides customizable workflows, backlog management, sprint planning, and extensive reporting capabilities.

2. Trello: Trello's Kanban-style boards simplify Agile workflows, offering flexibility and simplicity for task management, collaboration, and integration with other tools.

3. Vabro: Vabro enables real-time collaboration, incremental product development, and timely project delivery. It facilitates seamless coordination and collaborative building of product increments to ensure projects are completed on schedule.

4. Asana: While not explicitly designed for Agile, Asana's comprehensive platform supports task management, team collaboration, and project tracking. Its customizable workflows and project views can be adapted to Agile practices.

5. Monday.com: With a visual and intuitive interface, Monday.com offers features for task tracking, timeline planning, and team collaboration. It supports various Agile methodologies and can be customized to suit diverse project needs.

6. Azure DevOps: Azure DevOps provides a suite of tools tailored for Agile development, including Azure Boards for Agile planning and tracking, Azure Repos for version control, and Azure Pipelines for continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD)."