Agile Racecar: Software, Magic, and Life

Too often wannabe entrepreneurs fade out because they do not have the resources to put their ideas to the test. They may be able to talk to a customer or two, but there they often reach a dead end when the customer asks for a prototype or demo. It costs money - and takes time - to build one. And most aspiring entrepreneurs don't have a lot of money- or not enough - at least that's what they think. If you're an aspiring software entrepreneur, without an infinite capacity for risk, your prayers have just been answered. Imagine this scenario. The entrepreneur uses an online (web-based) agile project management tool to define the requirements. He then meets with potential customers, gets their feedback and refines the requirements, and prioritizes the features. Next the entrepreneur defines a short Release that contains the bare minimum functionality needed to "validate the business model". In plain English, this means that there's a customer out there who...

Mark my words, it is going to start happening within a year. I can see it in my Crystal Ball :) And remember, you read about it here first- Friday, Jan 27, 2006! Agile methodology, XP, and Hosted Agile Project Management tools (like Rally) are poised to take software entpreneurship and offshore outsourcing to the next level. India is finally going to shake off it's mentality of servitude and take major steps towards fostering Silicon Valley style innovation. How? Agile/XP approach of rapid, iterative development with customer feedback at its core is screaming from rooftops with a megaphone for very very v... early stage startups and budding software entrepreneurs to notice it. It's a marriage made in heaven! I can't think of a more natural fit of a solution to a problem. Agile development is for software entrepreneurs what lithium is for bipolar disorder (ok, so I guess the analogy proves that I can actually think of a more natural fit). ... contd. in "Ag...

UPDATE: Feb 2010: I wrote the following in Jan 2006 before I had enough exposure to User Stories and before I got stuck in the quagmire that Rally - at least in that version - turned out to be. I stopped using it a month later. The problem was ironically the same problem Agile development evolved to solve- Rally itself was over-engineered, tried to do much and did the simple & important things not well enough-- if at all. To make matters worse, it was very slow and highly cumbersome to input info into- these were the early days of Web 2.0 and Rally seemed to be going overboard with use of AJAX. I've heard good things about Rally again lately but haven't validated it for myself. I'll do a separate blog post on this topic when I do. I'm smitten by the Agile software development methodology. It's not as if I've heard about it only today, but now I have a tool that can (I believe) help me manage the CommuterStation product development in India more effectivel...