Difference between epics and features
In Visual Studio Team Services you can organize the backlog into epics, features and User stories .
For each epic, a set of associated features can be defined, and for each associated feature a set of associated user stories can be defined.
What I haven't figured out yet is the difference between epics and features. From what I researched " epic is a requirement very large, which needs to be divided into User stories ", but I don't understand the difference of that and of features.
Alias, even this definition of epic is subjective, because after all, how do I know that something is big enough to be a epic?
So, what really are epics , what really are features and what's the real difference between the two?
Some examples I saw in a video on internet:
-
Epic: Mobile strategy
- Feature: Mobile faviting
-
Epic: Continuous improvement
- Feature: Botify the wordoo service
- Feature: Improve performance
4 answers
I will explain how you understand in the code, even if it does not have a direct relationship between the terms:
Think of epic as the namespace, feature as the class, and story as the method. Because in each development has a module that has objects that has behaviors.
Reinforcement that there is no direct relationship between them, it is likely to have a different granularity when going to put in code.
Then epic it's a general description of what you want from the software. There are not many details and it is recommended to keep inside only one interaction. It is a way to organize (group) many features. An example is managing products.
Already a feature it is something a little more concrete than it will have, it has a little detail of what it is, its function. In case it is complex it should also keep within a developmental interaction. As an example we can cite insert the product engineering or the sale of the product.
As stories they say what should be done, what operations the user will do on top of that feature . Examples may be: seller issues Sales Order, financial approves sale, stockist separates products, forwarder issues invoice.
Obviously a story can use a feature within it, just as features can have other features. Eventually a feature does not need to have stories. The epic is interesting in more complex systems. It is unusual but a story may not be part of a feature.
So epic is not about size* but greatness, which are different things. Epic is at a level above summarization. It's like a country. There are countries smaller than States and municipalities, so the size does not matter, but the scope of it does.
All this it is part of the requirements analysis. If you do wrong, and everyone does, the development becomes complicated.
Epic, features, and User Stories are SCRUM artifacts, not VSTS definitions.
These artifacts help you break the values of your deliveries into expectation blocks.
In a very simple example, a simple Store System:
- Epic 1: Logistics
- Feature 1: stock items
- Story 1: as a user responsible for the stock, I want to list items that are in the stock;
- Story 2: as a package receiving agent, I wish be able to inform that new products have arrived in stock
- Feature 2: Invoices
- Story 1: as an accounting user, I want to launch NFs on the system;
- Feature 1: stock items
- Epic 2: Online Store
- Feature 1: Showcases
- Story 1: as a customer, I want to filter by products on sale
- Story 2: as a customer, I want to add an item to the shopping cart
- Feature 2: issue order purchase
- Story 1: as a customer, I want to create a purchase order
- Feature 1: Showcases
- Epic 2: Finance
- Feature 1: audit on Purchase Orders
So one can break your project into delivery values size.
You can see more at scrum Guis in Brazilian Portuguese .
Depends a lot on some own concepts. In general, Epic is something more abstract, it is a global concept and without much definition of its software. Already the feature is something more concrete and specific, I see a feature as a service that meets the user's need.
Epics and Features are work Item types.
You should use them to break the work in order to see the evolution of a project.
For more information, read the official Azure Devops documentation link: