Top Ten Agile – Kanban Tools

Even though Kanban will conjure up images of whiteboards and stickers more than anything else, truth is we also need software tools. If you are anything like me, the only two things you know you’d never lose are your head and the stuff you keep in your computer/online. Also, if you work with teams and people in remote locations, these tools can ease things up. From robust all-around tools such as Hansoft to more personal lightweight application such as Lino, here you have an always convenient list of agile tools, reviewed.

1. Agile Zen

Agile Zen is a simple, pay per month Agile tool that gets extra points for their do-good philosophy. If you work for a not-for profit organisation you get 50% off their already low price. Also, if you are working on a open source project, you get the tool for free.

The only downside to it I find is how, at this time is only offered as a hosted tool. However, if you want to try it out today, you can! Head over to AgileZen today to get started.

2. Flow

Flow is a hip-hop sounding ( horrible joke ) Agile tool based on Kanban, that allows you to visualize your work and organise and assign tasks amongst team member. One of the most powerful features of Flow is the accurate estimates of progress and pending work based on past performance. It also includes a vast range of metrics such as “Backlog to Done” cycle, Idle Time, etc.

The price is 5$ per person per month, if you want to seize a 30 days free trial, go have a look at Flow

3. Pivotal tracker

We had mentioned this tool a while ago http://agileevangelists.co.uk/task-management-software-pivotal-tracker/ so it is just polite to include it in our list. Pivotal Tracker balances well being complete with including just the essential, so you can focus on getting things done ( and code!). Did I mention is free too?

4. Hansoft

Hansoft is an very complete solution for lean development, collaborative Gantt scheduling, real-time reporting, bug tracking / QA, workload coordination, portfolio and document management. With an eye opping list of testimonials, Hansoft will be ideal for the most demanding teams with a diverse range of project management needs.

Accordingly, fees per user go at about £20 per month, but if you feel you need its full power, it may be worth a shoot at the 2-users free trial.

5. Kanbanery

Kanbanery is a easy, simple and elegant Scrum and kanban solution with a colum layout allowing you to observe your workflow easily. It is certainly one of the simplest and cheapest solution ( $19 a month ), so it is well suited for small teams or even for your own personal use. Actually, with Ipad and Iphone support, there is no reason not to Kanban your life 24/7.

However, not for focused on usability does it lose its power. With Kanbanery you can clearly observe your task story and average lead time, making easy for you to spot bottlenecks and improve your workflow.

6. Lino.

Lino is an endearing little application that mimics your pin board and allows you to stick notes of all colours, as well as pictures and videos. As you can see Lino is closer to a tool for personal use than to Kanban workflow visualisation but it all depends on how you use it. And if you love the look and feel of post-its but keep stubbornly loosing your physical notes or changing office locations, don’t miss out on this digital port-it fanfare.

Pricing is also part of the good news. Lino is a freemium tool, with a $3 dollars account permitting larger storage and unlimited download and search functionalities.

7. Radtrack

Radtrack is an open source kanban project used to create kanban boards that you can drag and drop from Backlog to Requested, In progress to Done. It can also yield different team members.

In addition, Being Open source means you can work on it (https://github.com/jgoodsen/radtrack-core#readme ) and that is free to use forever. Top man @jgoodsend for having created it and shared it with everyone.

8. Target Process.

This is one of the most powerful Agile tools, with an impressive range of reporting features (burn down charts ), a kanban board, sprints, iterations, tasking and integration with favourite tools you may already been using such as Visual Studio 2010, Eclipse, Subversion, JIRA, Bugzilla etc. The price for a hosted version is $25 and $225 for a desktop version.

There is a free version available for teams of 5 or less members, which can be a great way of testing the tool.

9.Simple kanban

Simple-Kanban is a Kanban board application and can be used in lean software development, ideal for stories development. It is as well open source, so free to use and work on. It comes as a simple downlodable HTML file.

Thanks to Stephan Schmidt for building it and releasing it. You can follow Stephan’s blog here: CodeMonkeysm

10. Ikan

Ikan is the Iphone/Ipad ( so far ) mobile application, brainchild of @ourfounder and Personal kanban. It is extremely stripped down and totally versatile for you to use in any sort of project. Best of all, goes with you anywhere.

It includes integration with Zen too, so if you are the Iphone type, go to the app store and download it for free