So I’m starting up a couple of side projects, and I’m hosting them on Visual Studio Online (VSO). I wanted to do them right, so I took a little time to review the way that the “Planning Tools” are currently implemented in VSO. It’s just me, plus a couple people feeding me ideas for features, so it’s not going to be Waterfall (cue eyeroll) or Full-On Scrum… But I do want the ability to easily add a feature story, a user story, etc. I created a couple of sample projects using the Scrum project template (the default), and the Agile project template (a conscious decision). In the end, I decided I preferred the Agile template.

They both support adding items to a Backlog Items queue, and a Feature Request queue, and they both have a Kanban board.

The deciding factor for me was that in the Sprint Template, you have to add a Task to a Backlog Item to move it on to the Kanban board. This is overhead that I don’t need. I’m making the decision in advance to break my backlog items down into small, meaningful chunks.

My Feature Request queue? That can be where the broad, sweeping requests go.

Anyhow – I’m looking forward to being able to give a couple of key Subject Matter Experts a login credential, have them throw in feature ideas, while I churn out features – all thanks to Visual Studio Online providing a User Friendly Experience that my team is going to LOVE!