Scrum tools – a summary

When working according to Scrum you face to choose between physical tools or SW
tools.

There are situations when SW tools are required, i.e. distributed development.
However, physical tools have the benefit of letting all information necessary to be
accessible in one place. Team members, ScrumMaster, Product Owner and
stakeholders can easily get access to the gathered information. Having all information
in one place promotes collaboration.

In the following a simple comparison, between visualization by means of white board

or similar and visualization by means of SW tools, is presented. It is followed by a list
of known SW tools with support for Scrum.

Comparison
Whiteboard or similar SW tool
Daily Scrum meeting in front You cannot find a display big
of task board makes the team enough for team members to
members focus on their task gather around and read all the
since everyone is reminded of details in connection with the
the goal, requirements and daily scrum meeting. There is
tasks of the Sprint. a risk that team members
communicate through the tool
instead of directly with each
other..
Team members can update You need to get access to the
status/progress by moving tool in order to find
cards or updating an estimate. information or a requirement
that is in need of updating.
Anyone who passes the You have to get access to the
working area of the team can tool in order to see status..
see the status at once just by
passing.

You may succeed by using a SW tool. The risk is that you miss the opportunity of
interaction and collaboration between team members.

In summary, a physical Sprint backlog or Task Board promotes communication and

collaboration. You will also get benefit from using the physical board as means for
reporting. It is a way of minimizing waste.

When working with distributed teams, the need to use tools may be large. Even then it
is a benefit to choose the simplest possible tool.
Known SW tools used for Agile and Scrum
The following is a list of known commercially available as well as open source and freeware
tools. The tools are listed without comments. The list does not claim to be covering all tools.
If you know of other tools, please let me know.
• Agemba*, http://www.agileleanhouse.com/whatewedo/products/agemba
• Agilo, http://architects.dzone.com/announcements/agilo-scrum-effective-scrum-to
• Boardthing, https://boardthing.com/
• Cardboard, https://www.cardboardit.com/
• Cardmeeting, http://cardmeeting.com/
• ClubHouse, https://clubhouse.io/
• Double Chocco Latte, http://dcl.sourgeforce.net
• ExtremePlanner, www.extremeplanner.com
• FeatureMap, https://www.featuremap.co/en
• GNATS, www.gnu.org/software/gnats
• Hansoft, https://hansoft.com/
• icescrum, https://www.icescrum.com/
• Iterate, www.diamond-sky/product/iterate
• Kanbanchi, https://www.kanbanchi.com/
• LeanKit, http://leankit.com/
• Lino, http://en.linoit.com/
• Mingle, http://studios.thoughtworks.com/mingle-project-intelligence
• Mural, https://mural.co/
• Pivotal Tracker, www.pivotaltracker.com
• ProjectCards, www.projectcards.com
• Rally, www.rallydev.com
• Scarab, http://scarab.tigris.org
• Scrum for Team System, https://scrumforteamsystem.codeplex.com/
• Scrumblr, http://scrumblr.ca/
• ScrumDesk, http://www.scrumdesk.com/
• ScrumDo, https://www.scrumdo.com/
• Scrumwiki, http://scrumwiki.org
• Scrumwise, http://www.scrumwise.com/
• ScrumWorks, www.collab.net/products/scrumworks
• Select Scope Manager, www.selectscopemanager.com
• Sococo, www.sococo.com/
• StoriesOnBoard, https://storiesonboard.com/
• Taiga, https://taiga.io/
• TargetProcess, www.targetprocess.com
• Trello, https://trello.com/
• TWiki XP Tracker Plugin, http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/Plugins/XpTrackerPlugin
• Upwave, https://www.upwave.io/product
• VersionOne, http://versionone.net/index.asp
• XP Plan-it, www.itwks.com/products/xp-planit
• XPCGI, http://xpcgi.sourgeforce.net
• Xplanner, www.xplanner.org
• XPWeb, http://xpweb.sourceforge.net
• Yodiz, https://www.yodiz.com/index.html

* Full disclosure: I own shares in the company developing Agemba