Estimating, planning and managing Agile Web development projects under a value-based perspective

Graphical abstractThis paper tries to answer the following question by identifying Agile practices and adapting them for being integrated into a coherent framework "Is it possible to define an Agile approach to estimate, plan and manage Web projects guided by business value". The paper includes the results obtained from a real experience dealing with applying the proposed framework. To finish, it states relevant conclusion.Display Omitted We propose a framework for Agile Web projects.Our framework focuses on estimation, planning, and management activities.We recommend an approach guided by business value.Our approach includes continuous improvement along the project.We present our first empirical experience of this framework.We take out a set of first conclusions in order to extent the model. ContextThe processes of estimating, planning and managing are crucial for software development projects, since the results must be related to several business strategies. The broad expansion of the Internet and the global and interconnected economy make Web development projects be often characterized by expressions like delivering as soon as possible, reducing time to market and adapting to undefined requirements. In this kind of environment, traditional methodologies based on predictive techniques sometimes do not offer very satisfactory results. The rise of Agile methodologies and practices has provided some useful tools that, combined with Web Engineering techniques, can help to establish a framework to estimate, manage and plan Web development projects. ObjectiveThis paper presents a proposal for estimating, planning and managing Web projects, by combining some existing Agile techniques with Web Engineering principles, presenting them as an unified framework which uses the business value to guide the delivery of features. MethodThe proposal is analyzed by means of a case study, including a real-life project, in order to obtain relevant conclusions. ResultsThe results achieved after using the framework in a development project are presented, including interesting results on project planning and estimation, as well as on team productivity throughout the project. ConclusionIt is concluded that the framework can be useful in order to better manage Web-based projects, through a continuous value-based estimation and management process.