How I Scrum

Posted on by Amir Karbasi

I am writing this post to give a general view of how I have implemented the scrum to collaborate with my fellow professionals. To get the real knowledge about scrum & its history, I suggest you read the book. This will be my implementation which holds the essence of the scrum.

1.Backlog a.k.a To-do List

The Team gathers all the tasks that need to be done. I use Trello with multiple lists such as :

  • Backlog (to-dos)
  • Done
  • Review

You can use any other task management system where it allows you to create tasks & lists. If the team is located at a single physical place & meet there to work everyday, It is even possible to have a board with sticky notes on it.

2.Sprint

The Sprint represents a duration of time between 1-2 weeks of concentrated work. Once the tasks for a sprint are chosen, they cannot be modified.

It is essential to keep Sprint periods short in order to quickly evaluate & improve the process.

3.Daily Stand-up

Every day the team meets at a fixed & previously agreed upon time for a duration of 10 to 15 minutes. Every member starts by describing :

  1. What they did prior to this Stand-up
  2. What are they going to do until the next Stand-up
  3. If there is any challenge or obstacle that is preventing or slowing them down with their task

If any team member faces an obstacle of any sort & another team member can help, they shall not make the meeting longer. They shall take note, wait till the Stand-up is finished & then have a separate meeting with that team member.

It is crucial to stick to points & not drag the meeting. The name “Stand-up” was chosen primarily to emphasize the necessity of the meeting to be short & concise.

If it takes more than 15 minutes, you are doing it wrong.

J.J. Sutherland the Founder of Scrum

4.Sprint Review

The last day of Sprint, The team gathers to present & review the work. This is also referred as “demo day”. The team should have something to present as a result of the works that has been done during the sprint.

Afterwards every team member providers their feedback regarding the process. This is not about blaming or complaining. The main topic of these feedbacks are :

  • What went bad during this sprint?
  • What could have gone better?

If there is any feedback of sort, the team should add it as a task to the backlog & then the next sprint cycle. It is important to figure out a way of testing or evaluating this improvement in the next sprint review.

5.Repeat

With the information in hand & the backlog, the team plans the next sprint & the tasks to be done. It is crucial to start the next sprint as soon as possible in order to be more effective.

New Figma Project Considerations

Posted on by Amir Karbasi
logo of figma

I am writing this post to convey some information for my fellow designers using figma. I hope this will make my collaboration with them better. I am going to be updating it whenever I find something new.

Main Layout Sizes

Since nowadays we work with multiple screen sizes, it is good to consider for what platform we are building our project for. Here I have some sizes for each platform.

  • Mobile : 600px
  • Tablet : 960px
  • Small Laptop / Large Screen Tablet : 1264px
  • Large Laptop / Desktop : 1904px

These are not words of god so they can be changed. The key is to know the platform you choose.

Layout Grid

I use 12 columns grid system which is used to make responsive UI elements. This video shows how to set these up :

Here are some default gutter sizes for major CSS frameworks:

Bootstrap : 30px (15px on each side of a column)

Vuetify : 24px (12px on each side of a column)

It’s also good to have a “center” grid type to always account for the empty spaces at start & end of the screen.

Positioning inside the grid

As a general rule :

  • Decide how wide your content will need using column as unit.
    • for instance : 2 column wide button, 1 column wide title
  • Do not use the default padding (gutter) of the column as a starting or ending point of your content
    • This will make the integration more difficult. It also breaks the definition of padding. Padding should be regarded as a space or empty space, not the content.

Is there a Navigation Drawer?

If you use a navigation drawer which is common in dashboard type designs, be careful not to include it in every page as it will make the integration more difficult. Create one page with the navigation drawer & only in that page describe everything related to it & the page in general.

Text Sizes

As a general rule, do not go below 14px unless you know what you are doing. I have come across many designs that looked good on their own but when I implemented them, the texts were tiny & difficult if not impossible to read.