ScrumLint: Identifying Violations of Agile Practices Using Development Artifacts

Abstract

Linting tools automatically identify source code fragments that do not follow a set of predefined standards. Such feedback tools are equally desirable for "linting" agile development processes. However, providing concrete feedback on process conformance is a challenging task, due to the intentional lack of formal agile process models. In this paper, we present ScrumLint, a tool that tackles this issue by analyzing development artifacts. On the basis of experiences with an undergraduate agile software engineering course, we defined a collection of process metrics. These contain the core ideas of agile methods and report deviations. Using this approach, development teams receive immediate feedback on their executed development practices. They can use this knowledge to improve their workflows, or can adapt the metrics to better reflect their project reality.