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A NEW FORCE is making itself felt in the world of software development. Advocates of the agile development methodology (www.agilealliance.com) claim that its potential to increase productivity in some areas is so bright that coders are going to need to wear shades to write software with it.
Instead of starting by developing a detailed set of requirements, agile methodologies call for programmers to begin by writing small chunks of functionality that can be completed in two to four weeks - "iterations," in agilespeak. Module testing receives the same level of attention as the actual writing of the code. When one iteration is done, developers find the next requirement to add more functionality to the module just completed and thereby start a new iteration.
Agile processes promise to deliver high-quality, functioning software at a fraction of the time and cost of traditional methods. Still, agile isn't likely to replace the so-called waterfall development methodologies, those proven ivory towers that have been used for the development of everything from missile guidance to widget-tracking ERP systems. For many projects, especially big ones with relatively fixed requirements, the Software Engineering Institute and its family...