To Agile, or not to Agile: A Comparison of Software Development Methodologies
This addresses the problem of choosing software development methodologies for organizations, but it is incremental as it builds on existing comparisons without introducing new methods.
The paper compared seven agile development methodologies against waterfall, finding that none entirely replace waterfall and agile methods struggle with technical debt and large-scale systems, concluding that no single methodology fits all projects.
Since the Agile Manifesto, many organizations have explored agile development methods to replace traditional waterfall development. Interestingly, waterfall remains the most widely used practice, suggesting that there is something missing from the many "flavors" of agile methodologies. We explore seven of the most common practices to explore this, and evaluate each against a series of criteria centered around product quality and adherence to agile practices. We find that no methodology entirely replaces waterfall and summarize the strengths and weaknesses of each. From this, we conclude that agile methods are, as a whole, unable to cope with the realities of technical debt and large scale systems. Ultimately, no one methodology fits all projects.