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167

answers:

1

We work with the scrum method. Let's assume the product owner wants a new functionality that allows the user to search the content of the website.

The total work is 8 points and these would be the user stories:

  • the user can input search terms (0 points)
  • the search results are displayed to the user (8 points)

I want to gain more insight in the progress of the developer. However I cannot break down these stories any further.

I could however rewrite the stories. I feel reluctant because these stories are technical stories.

  • add search text box (0 points)
  • create index table in the database (0 points)
  • make sure the index table is updated when data ABC changes (3 points)
  • make sure the index table is updated when data XYZ changes (2 points)
  • get results from the database (1 point)
  • compose the correct url per search result (2 points)

How do you handle these situations?

+10  A: 

You should not break down the stories into other technical stories any further.

During the Sprint Planning Meeting, the team breaks down the stories into tasks. Those tasks are then estimated in numbers of hours.

During the Sprint, you keep track of the number of remaining hours in the Sprint burndown charts.

The stories are for the end-users.

The tasks are for the team (UI Design, Development, Coding, Testing, Documenting, etc.)

David Segonds
I'd be even more specific: You *shouldn't* be breaking down to technical stuff at the story level. +1
krosenvold
Cool. Thanks for the prompt answer. This will settle the discussion we have in the office. The number of large stories is limited. For now, we will adapt the method and break down the stories into technical stories. It is good to know what the offical way is and make a concious decision to deviate.
Florian
@krosenvold I clarified my statement based on your input. Thanks.
David Segonds
The only case where you need to break stories down further is when a story is too big to be tackled in one sprint. But you should still do your best to split it on a user story level. This can be quite tricky sometimes if a user story is huge, but still can't be split further, but it's quite ok to be creative here.
Tommi Forsström