Please Advise On Optimal Project Management? [duplicate]

Question

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Please Advise On Project Management software

Assume I work as a part of a small team (2-3) people who are all remote from each other. We build web applications.

*) I use a project management web application to manage bugs/resources/specs etc
*) passwords are managed using keepassx and dropbox
*) we use git for version control and codebase/github
*) we use screencast and jing for screenshots and screencasts to share

..and my questions..

1) can I improve the above?
2) should I add a new layer - central dev server for testing application (using capistrano)?
3) real time collaboration solutions that don't cost $100,000/hour?
4) anything else you want to add?

I'd really appreciate some help. I've been taking on some increasingly large projects recently which demand some effective project management and workflow tools. Any advice or criticism is welcome!

Answer 1

For realtime collaboration it doesn't get any simpler and cheaper than Skype. I'd also advise adding some developer productivity measurement software like ProjectCodeMeter.

Answer 2

The biggest change when projects get larger is the need for a more robust methodology/techniques and not necessarily the tools. Without the right structure, even the best tools will provide little value.

Start by defining the areas in which your current tools/processes are falling short and what the "ideal" process would look like. From there, research and learn techniques that can help you get to that ideal.

Answer 3

You could consider using something like http://www.talkerapp.com/ or http://campfirenow.com/ or IRC to keep an ongoing shared chat running with the ability to share large pastes, images etc. That's what we do and we're not even remote, we're all in the same office.