Welcome to Agile ALM. This book has three main goals. The first is to describe Agile Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) in practical terms and to provide a plan for rolling out Agile strategies and best-of-breed tools. The second purpose is to explain how to create ALM toolboxes based on standard tools used in advanced, real-world cases. The third goal is to give you some guidance on how to choose the best tools, use them correctly, and integrate them while applying Agile strategies. These three goals are the focus of this book.

In these pages, I have tried to present all the information you’ll need to implement Agile ALM. I hope the book will also help you understand and put into practice the “tool chains” needed for automating builds, tests, and continuous integration for your applications, so you’ll be able to deliver quality applications without wasting time on repetitive tasks or hunting for the right set of strategies and tools.

The book starts with an overview of Agile ALM and then takes you deeper into the details. First, we’ll look at toolsets at a higher level and then dive into the essentials you’ll need in order to achieve success. It’s worth noting that while some versionspecific information is bound to change over time, the overall approach of this book will remain relevant, even as tools and strategies mature and evolve. The tool explanations are timeless because they focus on basic concepts and how to use the tools, rather than on details that will change from version to version.