Scott Ambler has a new article comparing most of the leading development methodologies. He also tries to recommend which methodology fits which kind of project (e.g. for a commercial of the shelf products use EUP/RUP, ISO 12207, TSP/PSP or Data Driven Approach).
The article serves as a nice overview of available methods - however Scott doesn't explain the reasoning on why he think a particular methodology fits (or doesn't) a certain type of application which is a pity. Furthermore, I think Scott is missing the point a little by neglecting organizational, cultural other people related reasons for choosing a methodology. For example if all your teams are versed with RUP, you would most likely "force-fit" it to your new COBOL project rather than choose a better fit methodology.
Also, I am not sure I agree with the all his mapping - the most notable example is mapping XP for safety critical projects. To get a DO-178B (the certification required by the FAA for aviation software) you need to have the following documents (DO-178B has 5 levels and not all documents are needed for all levels):
| DO-178B Documents: |
DO-178B Records: |
- Plan for Software Aspects of Certification (PSAC)
- Software Development Plan (SDP)
- Software Verification Plan (SVP)
- Software Configuration Management Plan (SCMP)
- Software Quality Assurance Plan (SQAP)
- Software Requirements Standards (SRS)
- Software Design Standards (SDS)
- Software Code Standards (SCS)
- Software Requirements Data (SRD)
- Software Design Description (SDD)
- Software Verification Cases and Procedures (SVCP)
- Software Life Cycle Environment Configuration Index (SECI)
- Software Configuration Index (SCI)
- Software Accomplishment Summary (SAS)
|
- Software Verification Results (SVR)
- Problem Reports
- Software Configuration Management Records
*list copied from LynxOS site |
I don't think that this level of formality is a good fit for XP