(Posted to Duck Pond from Software 2020)
Aren’t new enhancement requests, stories, bugs, and requirements all just “Tasks”? And instead of all the different tools today — Agile Project Backlog Management Tools, Bug Tracker Tools, Requirements Management Tools — shouldn’t those be just different views to manage these (or subsets of these) “Tasks”? I think so.

Story Boards, Requirements Specs, Bug Tracking Tools are all just different views of “Tasks”.

Given that perspective, a modern robust Tracker would manage all “Tasks” (whether they are the new Agile Stories, bugs, client issues, etc.) consolidated for team tracking and estimation to complete reports considering the team’s vacation calendar and all of their work combined.

Then modern Agile tools could help plan new releases taking into account information about the developers’ other work (hence their percent availability) and provide a better estimate of completion for the current sprints and releases. Useful tools then would help manage the current release (in Agile, that’s Story Boards and organized hierarchical views – grouping tasks into epics, stories and their children). And facilitate the team’s management of these Tasks as they move from concept to delivery.

But keep them in the bigger database of “Tasks” so managers can manage the team’s full effort, not just the current release.

That’s what Software 2020 does.