[SystemSafety] Agile methods

[Jon Davies]

On 30 August 2013 18:02, René Senden <rene.senden at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dear all,
>
> Do any of you have practical experience with reconciling established agile
> software development with software safety requirements (e.g. IEC-61508 or
> DO-178..) ?

Yes, and we usually end up throwing away the software developed using
"agile" methods, and starting again properly.

I'm taking "agile software development" as meaning the development of
software using processes consistent with the agile manifesto:
http://agilemanifesto.org/ - to quote the relevant part:
"...we value... working software over comprehensive documentation"

this is fundamentally in conflict with many of the things we know
about building high integrity software, and so "agile" methods are
fundamentally in conflict with developing software for safety critical
systems.

There's plenty to learn from agile development methods that might be
useful in high integrity software development, but that's a whole
different discussion.  Every time we discuss agile development here,
we end up back at the need to use a development process that builds in
correctness - we can't test exhaustively, so we need a process that
builds integrity in.  Agile methods don't do this.

Jon