Adopting Agile Software Development Methodologies in Big Data Projects – a Systematic Literature Review of Experience Reports

During the last decade, agile software development methodologies have been widely adopted in various project contexts. Big data projects are different from software engineering projects in all three aspects - people, processes and technologies. Recent research has shown that agile approaches are suitable and beneficial when applied in big data projects. The aim of the current study is to investigate which of the agile software development methodologies are currently applied in big data projects and what are the key considerations for their application. As a first step towards achieving this aim, the paper presents a systematic literature review of research articles reporting real-world experience of adopting agile methodologies in different big data science contexts. The findings of the study are beneficial to both practitioners and researchers to define and adopt agile approaches which are well suited for their big data projects.