A software methodology for applied research: eXtreme Researching

Abstract

Applied research is, by necessity, a distributed, collaborative process. To be useful, research methodologies must not only be applicable in such an environment, but must also be adaptive to the needs of human resources and specific research area requirements. This paper introduces eXtreme Researching (XR), an adaptation of eXtreme Programming (XP) by Ericsson, to support distributed telecommunications research and development. XR builds on XP and tailors it to meet the needs of applied industrial research. It adopts and extends the most useful elements of XP: collective ownership, planning game, continuous integration and metaphor and shows how they are applicable in multi-site, research projects. XPWeb is developed as a tool to facilitate XR in a distributed research environment. XPWeb and XR are actively used by Ericsson Applied Research and have been shown to significantly increase output and efficiencies in multi disciplinary research projects. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.