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How feasible is it to add a traditional template to the Agile template?


Geoff Binns (30424) | asked Feb 24 '16, 5:53 p.m.
We have created our own customised process template based on the traditional template. We may need to have a mixture of Project Areas based on our customised traditional template and some using the out-of-the box Agile template.

It has been suggested whether we could merge our customised traditional template into the Agile template to maintain a single process template. This would involve adding our custom work item types, roles and permissions to the Agile template so long as each template used unique names. Would there be any issues with task management.

I realise it may give a maintenance issue every time we upgraded RTC if the Agile process changed.

The Users in each Project Area would still operate either a traditional process or Agile process but not a mixed at the same time.

Is this sensible or feasible to do?

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Geoffrey Clemm (30.1k33035) | answered Feb 26 '16, 6:17 p.m.
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Yes, it is feasible to merge the processes of two project areas, but it would be a manual process, not an automated one. 
Whether it is sensible to do is largely based on how different those processes are.
If they are very different, then you will need to negotiate with the development teams about what would be a logical merge, and each team would be presented with the work item types of the other team that they would need to just ignore.   On the other hand, to the extent that you can get the two types of teams to agree on a merged process, the easier it will be for those two kinds of teams to interact.
So if you can get the teams to agree on a large common set of work item types, then it might be worth the effort, but if you cannot, then it is best to just maintain two different project area templates with largely distinct work item types.
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Donald Nong (14.5k414) | answered Feb 24 '16, 9:49 p.m.
I actually don't see any benefit of the merging. It can be confusing to the end users, to start with. They will ask questions like "why can I use this, but not that". It's not easy to maintain either, as you may have the same confusion as the end users.

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Geoff Binns commented Feb 25 '16, 7:11 a.m.

Hi Donald,

Thanks for the reply, I take your point.

The only benefitĀ  I can seeĀ is that we would only have to maintain/verify one Process template but it could be more complex.

Whether there is any benefit or not, do you know of any technical reason why it can't be done?

Would it matter what Users used even if they weren't meant to?


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Donald Nong commented Feb 25 '16, 10:57 p.m.

Not sure why you said "it can't be done". Technically, you can mash up the two process templates together whatever the way you like. Of course you should try not to share anything from the original process templates. For example, if you use the Defect work item type from the Agile template, you cannot have a work item type with the same name from the traditional template. I'm afraid I can't come up a better way to explain this as I don't really understand why they should be merged together.


Geoff Binns commented Feb 26 '16, 5:29 p.m.

Thanks Donald for your reply.

First, I was asking "why it can't be done".


Geoff Binns commented Feb 26 '16, 5:30 p.m.

Donald,

I take your point about sharing or I think you imply reusing (maybe?).
The reason we are considering this is we have a use case where in a Project Area we have multiple teams. The TAs will be for different domains like systems engineering, modelling, algorithm development, software, verification to name a few. Most teams may want to use the traditional process but a software development team area wish to use the Agile process.
We would rather all the teams exist in the same PA rather than in separate PAs as we may create x10s of PAs for the many different development projects within our business.
It is thought managing/maintaining 1 Process template is easier than 2 in the business.
Hope this helps to clarify.


Matt Muller commented Apr 13 '17, 7:18 a.m.

I've asked a similar question > in a new Question.

Ref Donalds comment: Technically, you can mash up the two process templates together whatever the way you like.

Technically which Scheduler would you use if you were going to combine?

FPM or Agile? use different attributes / Plans / Reports etc.

If it's possible - how?

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