Agile Spike

Agile Spike

What is a spike in sprint?

A Spike is created when a user story or task cannot be estimated well enough until the team has done further research or investigation. The result of a spike is an estimate for the original user story so that the sprint can move forward.

What is a spike task?

Spike. A task aimed at answering a question or gathering information, rather than at producing shippable product. Sometimes a user story is generated that cannot be well estimated until the development team does some actual work to resolve a technical question or a design problem.

Why is it called a spike?

The term spike comes from Extreme Programming (XP), where “A spike solution is a very simple program to explore potential solutions.” XP guru Ward Cunningham describes how the term was coined on the C2.com wiki: “I would often ask Kent [Beck], ‘What is the simplest thing we can program that will convince us we are on

What is sprint 0 and spike?

A spike usually has a zero story point and a zero sprint in Agile is an iteration where the team has focused on either spikes (investigations) or technical debts (defects) incurred from previous stories.

What is spike story in Jira?

Spikes are a type of exploration Enabler Story in SAFe. Defined initially in Extreme Programming (XP), they represent activities such as research, design, investigation, exploration, and prototyping.

Do you story point spikes?

Reasons to Not Point a Spike

Story points are a way of estimating complexity and size to the customer. Over time the customer may be able to learn what is expected out of an iteration. So if you start doing more spikes than story points, the customer could become confused.

When should I make a spike story?

When To Use Spike? Sometime the team unsure if they can complete the story due to some potential blockers and probably can’t even estimate the story. Thus, you may consider a spike as an investment for a Product Owner to figure out what needs to be built and how the team is going to build it.

What is risk based spike?

A risk-based spike is a spike carried out in response to a known risk. These can also be opportunities or threats. The team might find out that using a different programming language can speed up development, or they might find out that they can’t use the one they had planned to use.

What is spike DevOps?

A technical spike allows the team to decide how, when, and even if that piece of work will be done at all. In DevOps and Lean Startup terms, this means that there can be no Minimum Viable Product developed in a spike because nothing is being prepared that will be of release quality.

Robert Thorne
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Robert Thorne

Robert Thorne covers electric vehicle innovations, autonomous driving systems, global mobility trends, and automotive engineering developments.