Home > Store

User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development

Register your product to gain access to bonus material or receive a coupon.

User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development

Best Value Purchase

Book + eBook Bundle

  • Your Price: $59.39
  • List Price: $98.98
  • Includes EPUB and PDF
  • About eBook Formats
  • This eBook includes the following formats, accessible from your Account page after purchase:

    ePub EPUB The open industry format known for its reflowable content and usability on supported mobile devices.

    Adobe Reader PDF The popular standard, used most often with the free Adobe® Reader® software.

    This eBook requires no passwords or activation to read. We customize your eBook by discreetly watermarking it with your name, making it uniquely yours.

More Purchase Options

Book

  • Your Price: $43.99
  • List Price: $54.99
  • Usually ships in 24 hours.

eBook (Watermarked)

  • Your Price: $35.19
  • List Price: $43.99
  • Includes EPUB and PDF
  • About eBook Formats
  • This eBook includes the following formats, accessible from your Account page after purchase:

    ePub EPUB The open industry format known for its reflowable content and usability on supported mobile devices.

    Adobe Reader PDF The popular standard, used most often with the free Adobe® Reader® software.

    This eBook requires no passwords or activation to read. We customize your eBook by discreetly watermarking it with your name, making it uniquely yours.

About

Features

Learn to build robust software that more closely meets the customer's needs through applying the concept of user stories.

° A clear explanation of the most agile means of gathering software requirements

° Thoroughly reviewed and eagerly anticipated by the agile software development community

° Allows the reader to save time and resources by gathering the proper requirements BEFORE coding begins

Description

  • Copyright 2004
  • Dimensions: 7" x 9-1/4"
  • Pages: 304
  • Edition: 1st
  • Book
  • ISBN-10: 0-321-20568-5
  • ISBN-13: 978-0-321-20568-1

Thoroughly reviewed and eagerly anticipated by the agile community, User Stories Applied offers a requirements process that saves time, eliminates rework, and leads directly to better software.

The best way to build software that meets users' needs is to begin with "user stories": simple, clear, brief descriptions of functionality that will be valuable to real users. In User Stories Applied, Mike Cohn provides you with a front-to-back blueprint for writing these user stories and weaving them into your development lifecycle.

You'll learn what makes a great user story, and what makes a bad one. You'll discover practical ways to gather user stories, even when you can't speak with your users. Then, once you've compiled your user stories, Cohn shows how to organize them, prioritize them, and use them for planning, management, and testing.

  • User role modeling: understanding what users have in common, and where they differ
  • Gathering stories: user interviewing, questionnaires, observation, and workshops
  • Working with managers, trainers, salespeople and other "proxies"
  • Writing user stories for acceptance testing
  • Using stories to prioritize, set schedules, and estimate release costs
  • Includes end-of-chapter practice questions and exercises

User Stories Applied will be invaluable to every software developer, tester, analyst, and manager working with any agile method: XP, Scrum... or even your own home-grown approach.

Sample Content

Online Sample Chapter

Telling Stories and User Role Modeling

Sample Pages

Download the sample pages (includes Chapter 3 and Index)

Table of Contents


Foreword.
Acknowledgments.
Introduction.

I: GETTING STARTED.

1: An Overview.


What Is a User Story?

Where Are the Details?

“How Long Does It Have to Be?”

The Customer Team.

What Will the Process Be Like?

Planning Releases and Iterations.

What Are Acceptance Tests?

Why Change?

Summary.

Questions.

2: Writing Stories.


Independent.

Negotiable.

Valuable to Purchasers or Users.

Estimatable.

Small.

Testable.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

3: User Role Modeling.


User Roles.

Role Modeling Steps.

Two Additional Techniques.

What If I Have On-Site Users?

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

4: Gathering Stories.


Elicitation and Capture Should Be Illicit.

A Little Is Enough, or Is It?

Techniques.

User Interviews.

Questionnaires.

Observation.

Story-Writing Workshops.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

5: Working with User Proxies.


The Users' Manager.

A Development Manager.

Salespersons.

Domain Experts.

The Marketing Group.

Former Users.

Customers.

Trainers and Technical Support.

Business or Systems Analysts.

What to Do When Working with a User Proxy.

Can You Do It Yourself?

Constituting the Customer Team.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

6: Acceptance Testing User Stories.


Write Tests Before Coding.

The Customer Specifies the Tests.

Testing Is Part of the Process.

How Many Tests Are Too Many?

The Framework for Integrated Test.

Types of Testing.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

7: Guidelines for Good Stories.


Start with Goal Stories.

Slice the Cake.

Write Closed Stories.

Put Constraints on Cards.

Size the Story to the Horizon.

Keep the UI Out as Long as Possible.

Some Things Aren't Stories.

Include User Roles in the Stories.

Write for One User.

Write in Active Voice.

Customer Writes.

Don't Number Story Cards.

Don't Forget the Purpose.

Summary.

Questions.

II: ESTIMATING AND PLANNING.

8: Estimating User Stories.


Story Points.

Estimate as a Team.

Estimating.

Triangulate.

Using Story Points.

What If We Pair Program?

Some Reminders.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

9: Planning a Release.


When Do We Want the Release?

What Would You Like in It?

Prioritizing the Stories.

Mixed Priorities.

Risky Stories.

Prioritizing Infrastructural Needs.

Selecting an Iteration Length.

From Story Points to Expected Duration.

The Initial Velocity.

Creating the Release Plan.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

10: Planning an Iteration.


Iteration Planning Overview.

Discussing the Stories.

Disaggregating into Tasks.

Accepting Responsibility.

Estimate and Confirm.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

11: Measuring and Monitoring Velocity.


Measuring Velocity.

Planned and Actual Velocity.

Iteration Burndown Charts.

Burndown Charts During an Iteration.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

III: FREQUENTLY DISCUSSED TOPICS.

12: What Stories Are Not.


User Stories Aren't IEEE 830.

User Stories Are Not Use Cases.

User Stories Aren't Scenarios.

Summary.

Questions.

13: Why User Stories?


Verbal Communication.

User Stories Are Comprehensible.

User Stories Are the Right Size for Planning.

User Stories Work for Iterative Development.

Stories Encourage Deferring Detail.

Stories Support Opportunistic Development.

User Stories Encourage Participatory Design.

Stories Build Up Tacit Knowledge.

Why Not Stories?

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

14: A Catalog of Story Smells.


Stories Are Too Small.

Interdependent Stories.

Goldplating.

Too Many Details.

Including User Interface Detail Too Soon.

Thinking Too Far Ahead.

Splitting Too Many Stories.

Customer Has Trouble Prioritizing.

Customer Won't Write and Prioritize the Stories.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

15: Using Stories with Scrum.


Scrum Is Iterative and Incremental.

The Basics of Scrum.

The Scrum Team.

The Product Backlog.

The Sprint Planning Meeting.

The Sprint Review Meeting.

The Daily Scrum Meeting.

Adding Stories to Scrum.

A Case Study.

Summary.

Questions.

16: Additional Topics.


Handling NonFunctional Requirements.

Paper or Software?

User Stories and the User Interface.

Retaining the Stories.

Stories for Bugs.

Summary.

Developer Responsibilities.

Customer Responsibilities.

Questions.

IV: AN EXAMPLE.

17: The User Roles.


The Project.

Identifying the Customer.

Identifying Some Initial Roles.

Consolidating and Narrowing.

Role Modeling.

Adding Personas.

18: The Stories.


Stories for Teresa.

Stories for Captain Ron.

Stories for a Novice Sailor.

Stories for a Non-Sailing Gift Buyer.

Stories for a Report Viewer.

Some Administration Stories.

Wrapping Up.

19: Estimating the Stories.


The First Story.

Advanced Search.

Rating and Reviewing.

Accounts.

Finishing the Estimates.

All the Estimates.

20: The Release Plan.


Estimating Velocity.

Prioritizing the Stories.

The Finished Release Plan.

21: The Acceptance Tests.


The Search Tests.

Shopping Cart Tests.

Buying Books.

User Accounts.

Administration.

Testing the Constraints.

A Final Story.

V: APPENDICES.

Appendix A: An Overview of Extreme Programming.


Roles.

The Twelve Practices.

XP's Values.

The Principles of XP.

Summary.

Appendix B: Answers to Questions.


Chapter 1, An Overview.

Chapter 2, Writing Stories.

Chapter 3, User Role Modeling.

Chapter 4, Gathering Stories.

Chapter 5, Working with User Proxies.

Chapter 6, Acceptance Testing User Stories.

Chapter 7, Guidelines for Good Stories.

Chapter 8, Estimating User Stories.

Chapter 9, Planning a Release.

Chapter 10, Planning an Iteration.

Chapter 11, Measuring and Monitoring Velocity.

Chapter 12, What Stories Are Not.

Chapter 13, Why User Stories?

Chapter 14, A Catalog of Story Smells.

Chapter 15, Using Stories with Scrum.

Chapter 16, Additional Topics.

References.


Index.

Updates

Submit Errata

More Information

InformIT Promotional Mailings & Special Offers

I would like to receive exclusive offers and hear about products from InformIT and its family of brands. I can unsubscribe at any time.

Overview


Pearson Education, Inc., 221 River Street, Hoboken, New Jersey 07030, (Pearson) presents this site to provide information about products and services that can be purchased through this site.

This privacy notice provides an overview of our commitment to privacy and describes how we collect, protect, use and share personal information collected through this site. Please note that other Pearson websites and online products and services have their own separate privacy policies.

Collection and Use of Information


To conduct business and deliver products and services, Pearson collects and uses personal information in several ways in connection with this site, including:

Questions and Inquiries

For inquiries and questions, we collect the inquiry or question, together with name, contact details (email address, phone number and mailing address) and any other additional information voluntarily submitted to us through a Contact Us form or an email. We use this information to address the inquiry and respond to the question.

Online Store

For orders and purchases placed through our online store on this site, we collect order details, name, institution name and address (if applicable), email address, phone number, shipping and billing addresses, credit/debit card information, shipping options and any instructions. We use this information to complete transactions, fulfill orders, communicate with individuals placing orders or visiting the online store, and for related purposes.

Surveys

Pearson may offer opportunities to provide feedback or participate in surveys, including surveys evaluating Pearson products, services or sites. Participation is voluntary. Pearson collects information requested in the survey questions and uses the information to evaluate, support, maintain and improve products, services or sites, develop new products and services, conduct educational research and for other purposes specified in the survey.

Contests and Drawings

Occasionally, we may sponsor a contest or drawing. Participation is optional. Pearson collects name, contact information and other information specified on the entry form for the contest or drawing to conduct the contest or drawing. Pearson may collect additional personal information from the winners of a contest or drawing in order to award the prize and for tax reporting purposes, as required by law.

Newsletters

If you have elected to receive email newsletters or promotional mailings and special offers but want to unsubscribe, simply email information@informit.com.

Service Announcements

On rare occasions it is necessary to send out a strictly service related announcement. For instance, if our service is temporarily suspended for maintenance we might send users an email. Generally, users may not opt-out of these communications, though they can deactivate their account information. However, these communications are not promotional in nature.

Customer Service

We communicate with users on a regular basis to provide requested services and in regard to issues relating to their account we reply via email or phone in accordance with the users' wishes when a user submits their information through our Contact Us form.

Other Collection and Use of Information


Application and System Logs

Pearson automatically collects log data to help ensure the delivery, availability and security of this site. Log data may include technical information about how a user or visitor connected to this site, such as browser type, type of computer/device, operating system, internet service provider and IP address. We use this information for support purposes and to monitor the health of the site, identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents and appropriately scale computing resources.

Web Analytics

Pearson may use third party web trend analytical services, including Google Analytics, to collect visitor information, such as IP addresses, browser types, referring pages, pages visited and time spent on a particular site. While these analytical services collect and report information on an anonymous basis, they may use cookies to gather web trend information. The information gathered may enable Pearson (but not the third party web trend services) to link information with application and system log data. Pearson uses this information for system administration and to identify problems, improve service, detect unauthorized access and fraudulent activity, prevent and respond to security incidents, appropriately scale computing resources and otherwise support and deliver this site and its services.

Cookies and Related Technologies

This site uses cookies and similar technologies to personalize content, measure traffic patterns, control security, track use and access of information on this site, and provide interest-based messages and advertising. Users can manage and block the use of cookies through their browser. Disabling or blocking certain cookies may limit the functionality of this site.

Do Not Track

This site currently does not respond to Do Not Track signals.

Security


Pearson uses appropriate physical, administrative and technical security measures to protect personal information from unauthorized access, use and disclosure.

Children


This site is not directed to children under the age of 13.

Marketing


Pearson may send or direct marketing communications to users, provided that

  • Pearson will not use personal information collected or processed as a K-12 school service provider for the purpose of directed or targeted advertising.
  • Such marketing is consistent with applicable law and Pearson's legal obligations.
  • Pearson will not knowingly direct or send marketing communications to an individual who has expressed a preference not to receive marketing.
  • Where required by applicable law, express or implied consent to marketing exists and has not been withdrawn.

Pearson may provide personal information to a third party service provider on a restricted basis to provide marketing solely on behalf of Pearson or an affiliate or customer for whom Pearson is a service provider. Marketing preferences may be changed at any time.

Correcting/Updating Personal Information


If a user's personally identifiable information changes (such as your postal address or email address), we provide a way to correct or update that user's personal data provided to us. This can be done on the Account page. If a user no longer desires our service and desires to delete his or her account, please contact us at customer-service@informit.com and we will process the deletion of a user's account.

Choice/Opt-out


Users can always make an informed choice as to whether they should proceed with certain services offered by InformIT. If you choose to remove yourself from our mailing list(s) simply visit the following page and uncheck any communication you no longer want to receive: www.informit.com/u.aspx.

Sale of Personal Information


Pearson does not rent or sell personal information in exchange for any payment of money.

While Pearson does not sell personal information, as defined in Nevada law, Nevada residents may email a request for no sale of their personal information to NevadaDesignatedRequest@pearson.com.

Supplemental Privacy Statement for California Residents


California residents should read our Supplemental privacy statement for California residents in conjunction with this Privacy Notice. The Supplemental privacy statement for California residents explains Pearson's commitment to comply with California law and applies to personal information of California residents collected in connection with this site and the Services.

Sharing and Disclosure


Pearson may disclose personal information, as follows:

  • As required by law.
  • With the consent of the individual (or their parent, if the individual is a minor)
  • In response to a subpoena, court order or legal process, to the extent permitted or required by law
  • To protect the security and safety of individuals, data, assets and systems, consistent with applicable law
  • In connection the sale, joint venture or other transfer of some or all of its company or assets, subject to the provisions of this Privacy Notice
  • To investigate or address actual or suspected fraud or other illegal activities
  • To exercise its legal rights, including enforcement of the Terms of Use for this site or another contract
  • To affiliated Pearson companies and other companies and organizations who perform work for Pearson and are obligated to protect the privacy of personal information consistent with this Privacy Notice
  • To a school, organization, company or government agency, where Pearson collects or processes the personal information in a school setting or on behalf of such organization, company or government agency.

Links


This web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects Personal Information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this web site.

Requests and Contact


Please contact us about this Privacy Notice or if you have any requests or questions relating to the privacy of your personal information.

Changes to this Privacy Notice


We may revise this Privacy Notice through an updated posting. We will identify the effective date of the revision in the posting. Often, updates are made to provide greater clarity or to comply with changes in regulatory requirements. If the updates involve material changes to the collection, protection, use or disclosure of Personal Information, Pearson will provide notice of the change through a conspicuous notice on this site or other appropriate way. Continued use of the site after the effective date of a posted revision evidences acceptance. Please contact us if you have questions or concerns about the Privacy Notice or any objection to any revisions.

Last Update: November 17, 2020