Since the introduction of agile development methodologies as an identified alternative to classic waterfall style development in the late nineties (agile methods themselves not being an entirely new innovation; their packaging and identification as such however, was) there has been a great deal of debate over their efficacy and utility. They have been called out as gimmicks, accused of under-delivering, and accused of engendering scope creep, lousy documentation, and a host of other longstanding programming evils. In a field where quantifiable results are difficult to measure, the agile movement has had difficulty proving itself as the preferred alternative in modern programming methodologies.

The best sign of a win in this battle is a consensus adoption among developers. This, too, can be difficult to measure; anecdotally, I have personally seen a wider recognition and acceptance of agile among both corporate and independent developers, but that doesn't mean much. Nor, I suppose, does this ComputerWorld article, which identifies many agile precepts (although without recognizing them as such) as not only keys to success for many Web 2.0 ventures, but as being worthy of adoption by enterprise developers.

Of course I am already a convert, and I have seen enterprise coders moving increasingly in this direction for a number of years now. There are still shops which are stuck in the waterfall model stone age, however. In some cases, it may not be worth changing; not all the criticisms of agile are misplaced (although I believe they can all be managed; conversely, so can many of the critiques of the waterfall model) and if acceptable results are coming from traditional methods used by a stable team, there's no point breaking their patterns in the hopes of something better.

As ComputerWorld suggests, however, there is some reason to think that the general acceptance and occasional success of the Web 2.0 model, which is now so strongly associated with agile methods, may also be proving the utility of agile in the only realm that matters: commercial success.