Rally Software Reviews

It is the only solution that we are using now for all of the project management activities in our organization.

This tool is basically used for our IT project management in our organization.

In regards to the customization part, sometimes it is not understandable. Things are not so clear, such as how to customize it for our needs. We need to have a lot more user-friendly options.

Most of the things are associated with the user-friendly options. Currently, the reporting and matrix connections are a little bit sketchy.

There should also be a lot of customization opportunities, especially being able to add additional filters for the project management. If those things improved, it would make this tool more beneficial for us.

In my current organization, I have been using this solution for three years.

We did not encounter any issues. The stability is good.

In terms of the scalability, not many issues were experienced.

I've never used technical support. Most of the things are always working all of the time.

Before CA Agile, we were using HPE Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) and HPE Quality Center software.

HPE was mostly for waterfall and this CA solution was more for agile. That is the reason why we switched to the CA tool.

For the ALM tool, they are still implementing the agile part, so the full functionality was not available on ALM's side.

The setup was complex. We have a very big connection, extremely big. Everything is complex.

I was not involved in any evaluation process because we are an organization level division. We have nearly 20,000 developers in the IT support team and most of them use this tool. This tool's implementation in the enterprise was from the senior management level.

I am a software tester, so the features I found that are valuable to me are importing of test cases, creating new test cases, editing test cases, executing test cases, and generating test reports.

Creating test cases is important to me because it allows to me write test cases in an MS Excel spreadsheet and quickly import them into CA Agile Central, saving me a lot of time having to manually rewrite the test cases.

Editing of test cases is also very important because I can quickly make changes to reflect changes in the user stories.

Generating reports is a great tool and is very important because I can create a test case and results, and share with other members who don’t have CA Agile Central access.

Using CA Agile Central, my organization was able to develop, test, and deploy software much quicker than we used to under the waterfall methodology.

The ability to customize reports needs improving by providing users with features for selecting what they want to see on the reports, how they want to lay out the reports, and create a schedule for a report to be generated automatically and sent by email.

When I create a custom report (see below screen), I want to be able to have my report run automatically once a day and email the scrum master.

We have used this solution for over five years.

We have not encountered any stability issues.

We have not encountered any scalability issues.

I have never had to use technical support.

I am not aware of any other previous solutions.

We primarily use the solution to scale agile and for safety.

We use all of the features. It's been a great solution so far.

It's very user-friendly.

We are able to implement PI planning for safety.

We'd like to be able to export information about the users, like rules. It's not easy to identify the teams, users, and rules. We'd like better dashboards to make visibility better. They are a bit complex right now. 

It is not integrated with the PPM. It's very difficult to make an integration with both.

I've been using the solution for seven years. 

We have 1,000 to 1,800 users on the solution right now. We bought 2,000 licenses. 

The solution helps us scale our agile projects. 

I'm at a different company now, and they use ServiceNow. 

We renew licensing every three years and pay for the solution yearly.

I was a user and customer. 

I'd rate the solution ten out of ten. I've very happy with the solution. 

It is used to track any enhancements or new integrations. We have integrations from mainframe systems to RESTful services. We also have a few SOAP integrations. Essentially, we use the feature level of Rally to document what the interface is and then the engineers make the user stories within the feature to represent the tasks that they need to do to complete the interface, which includes everything from making the design document to the activities that they do in IIB, such as deploying the code to production. Our version has probably been updated within the last three months.

It is kind of set up for Scrum or Agile, but we sort of use it more in a kind of hybrid way. It does help build accountability because, during stand-up, you have to see what everybody is doing, why certain things are in red, and why someone is not where he or she is supposed to be.

We use the roadmap features, and we're getting better at using dates to use the roadmap so that we can see if we're on target for work. 

What I don't like about it is that it is really hard to find old work to reference information and use the reporting section of the application in terms of trying to analyze trends. If I am trying to find out which interfaces took this long and I want to compare and measure improvement from one quarter to another quarter, the reporting mechanism within Rally is very troublesome. They have an Excel plugin that you're supposed to use, but you literally have to pull the raw data out before you can do the analysis. You can't do it within Rally, and if you can, it is a secret, and I don't know how to do it. It should have better, easier, and user-friendly reporting without having to use the Excel add-in.

It is very clunky. There is a lot of data in there, but it is not organized in such a way that makes it intuitive. You really have to kind of look for where do you put your documentation or dates. Some customization is available, but it is not plug-and-play like Jira. When I switched from TFS to Jira, I just went and started using Jira, whereas with Rally, you kind of have to really get in and figure out what you need to do before you set stuff up, or you're going to get yourself stuck. You can just start using Jira and be successful.

It is kind of hit and miss. Sometimes, it is really reliable. I'm not sure if the delays that we see intermittently when it hangs up are because we've all gone remote now, and there are different people with different types of remote devices. I don't know if they are because of Rally.

Different teams that I've been with in the same organization use different tools. I have used TFS and Jira. I would go back to Jira or TFS in a minute. I don't find Rally good for scaling what we're doing. A good percentage of this part of my organization does use Rally, but I don't find it conducive to building transparency across the organization. We should either have TFS, Jira, or Rally. However, because of the lack of reporting, Rally won't be suitable and scalable for the whole organization. People want to see and measure what teams are able to do, and if they can't do that quickly, senior leadership is not going to be on board. If every team had to dig as much as I have to dig, it is not scalable.

In terms of users, we have implementation consultants, which is kind of a hybrid role between a BA, a PM, and a QA. We also have engineers, application developers, business analysts, managers, project managers, and directors. We have senior leadership, like AVPs, who periodically go in there and look at stuff randomly, but for the most part, it is usually used by managers and frontline staff like myself. About 80% of teams in our business unit are using Rally. My team has 15, but the number is easily more than that.

I have not had to deal with them.

I would advise others to make sure that they have full training in terms of the connection between features, user stories, and epics. They should also fully understand how to configure it in terms of providing visibility across teams that have to work with each other.

I would rate Rally Software a six out of ten.

Software development and infrastructure.

Sprint planning and overall work management of the stories and the project lifecycle.

Sprint planning is valuable because it keeps our teams all in the same place in terms of where information is stored. We always know what the status of a project is and anybody can see it.

• Ease of use
• Visibility

As a PMO Manager, I need to be able to look and see what the project status at any time without having to go ask somebody or look for a status report. So, I could go there and see exactly what percentage is complete, what the blockers might be, and just see who is assigned to what, so I can look at resourcing.

It has made our company more organized and it is helping us be more true to the agile principle. When I came to the company, we did not have any agile practices in place. So, it has helped us, because it gives us a framework to put the agile practices in place. 

The integrations with the PPM tool and making sure those two work well together. 

Improved engagement with TFS, because we still used TFS for code management. There is an API between the two. I think that the APR could be easier to set up and the API could be a little more fluid in terms of when the code is checked in. It really relates to how a project is updated based on that.

Stability is better. A couple years ago before CA bought it, we had a lot of problems. Now, we do not have as many problems. So, it has been good.

Scalability is getting better. It used to not be as good, but they are adding some features that make it easier to build portfolio items in.

The problem before was that there were just a lot of little bugs where you create a project in one place and it would not continue to exist in another. Also, there were not very good templates or anything. So, they are improving on that. 

I have not really used the technical support.

We did not have a solution when I started. I picked it because I was familiar with it from a previous company. I actually used it for a couple years before that, as well. I just knew we needed something that we could hit the ground running with pretty quickly.

I was involved in the initial setup and subsequent upgrades. 

I am not really sure how it is now to set up. If you are putting into a GreenField brand new product, I do not know how that would work now. Previously, it was just figuring it out on your own.

Upgrading was pretty straightforward, especially if you are used to using any of the agile tools in the agile practices. Once you get used to some of the unique namings for Agile Central, or formerly Rally, it is pretty straightforward. It is a like-for-like, in terms of what you have learned, in terms of being agile in what you learned on what you are doing on a day-to-day basis. 

The vendors on the shortlist would be TFS's Project Management through Microsoft, ServiceNow's Project Management, and JIRA.

Earlier on, we went a little faster and we did not do a full software evaluation. We actually are doing a tools assessment now. We are going to be looking at replacing CA, possibly, because we want to make sure we have the right tools. We want to make sure that they flow between all the different tool sets that we have. 

It has performed well so far. It has improved over the past couple of years.

For any product, do a full software evaluation and make sure you actually test them side-by-side with like-for-like test cases. Then you know exactly what you are getting yourself into. Otherwise, you build out and realize it might not be the right product for you. So, a full software analysis is important.

Most important criteria when selecting a vendor: Initial support is always important. It is always great when you can have a few free hours to have somebody to come in and help you understand the idiosyncrasies of any software, figuring out exactly what the best way is for it to be set up. Otherwise, you are just trying by trial by error. So, that is important. Also, stability is important.

I like it because I have several projects, and it keeps me on track for each one. So, I can track each iteration of each project, and see where I'm at and where other people are at, visually. I guess maybe the iteration planning and tracking status is the most valuable feature.

It has helped a great deal in the fact that we are able to take small chunks of data and get them actually moved forward end to end. Previously, we had to wait several months before something would actually be available for the end user. This has helped us to break that and to move forward quickly.

I think I'd like to be able to color-code the words more easily, not just the side. You can change the color on the side, but to actually change the font color would be useful.

Currently, I use an HTML color font to change the title of a user's story or something. If, instead of having to put in the HTML version of it, to make it change the color of the font, and I could easily change the color of the fonts, it would be a lot better.

I have been using the solution for two years.

I think occasionally it will slow down, particularly when we have a lot of users on the same project, especially around stand-up time or whatever, because we're spread out across the country, so we usually do it by phone. So when everybody is on the project at the exact same time, it will slow down a little bit.

Also, if I make a change and somebody else makes a change, you can't retain both changes. It doesn't accept both. The first one who finishes, who hits Enter, Save, Done or whatever, will get the change.

Then, it will warn you. It will say, "Do you want to keep your changes or the other person's changes?" But you don't know what they are changing, and they don't know what you're changing!

It slows down a little bit if you have a lot of information in there. It seems to work really well, however.

I like the personalization of the home screen because I may not want to look at everything, i.e., the same things that other people want to look at. So it's nice to be able to personalize my home screen. I have a lot of stuff on my home screen, and it seems to be able to handle it just fine.

We have an administrator, and I've had to have people added back in because they don't go in there and use it, and get suspended. Then they ask, "How come my name's not in here?" So you have to respond: "Because you never use it."

I haven't really had any help from technical support.

We previously used a different solution. We switched to be able to move more quickly to a resolution. Because the industry changes quickly, we can't still be in development stages on a product that needs to be out in the consumer's hands today. That's why we moved on to something like this where we can actually get things out there quicker.

The setup is very straightforward.

I have no input as far as the cost is concerned. That goes further up the chain than me.

I would definitely say it's a very good solution to have for a company, yes.

As a requirements engineer, most valuable is user story writing/editing/reviewing with peers.

It is supposed to shorten the project’s lifecycle. I do not have proof of this.

The text editor is for sure an area with room for improvement. Under IE 11, the Backspace key is not functioning as expected; it deletes and also inserts empty rows. If you continue, you end up with a lot of empty rows that you do not want. The DEL key, as well. Formatting is difficult.

A CR (carriage return) always creates a new paragraph. But sometimes you just want to stress something in relation to previous statement, but you do not want it in a new paragraph.

Pasting text from Word can create a lot of formatting issues, mostly in cases when the font is not recognized. Also, features such as graphics and tables are supported but only if coming from Word. So, if you want to eliminate a column or a row, you need to go back into Word, make the update, and then past back in the editor. In fact, if you want to come back to a text and edit it, it is very difficult to maintain the initial format.

These issues slowed down my work.

My comments are meant to help improve the product, not criticize it.

I have used Agile Central for five years.

We have not had stability issues.

We have not had scalability issues.

Technical support is very good.

This is our first solution for agile projects.

Setup was somehow difficult until all folders had been created and the rules on how to use them were set up. This has nothing to do with the product itself.

I had no involvement in this, so no advice.

It was a company decision. I just adopted the company decision.

Be very clear in agile and then “map” your knowledge into the product setup.

The most valuable feature of this solution is the Kanban board. The team board that you can see, and enables you to capture the working agreements as well as the date and stage. Because that feature is not available in Jira, I found it useful. In terms of metrics, Rally assists you with capture, allowing you to better understand cycle time and lead time metrics. Those are the features of Rally that I really enjoy.

Rally has the ability to improve the features. We would like to see progress made against the features, probably in the form of a dashboard, where when teams complete stories, the features upload, and the stories are completed, and the feature about them gets updated with the progress. This is available in Jira but not in Rally.

That's something I would like to see because the management wants to see how far we have come with the epics and the features. They want a dashboard that would allow Rally to provide a picture to the leadership of the progress made on the epics and features.

There should also be an automation feature. When the last story in the feature is finished, the feature's status should be automatically updated.

The user interface can be improved. I still don't think the UI is as impressive as Azure DevOps or Jira.

The performance can still be improved.

Rally Software should develop an OKR framework that will allow OKRs to be recorded in Rally. That would be a win-win situation because there would be changes for Rally Software because there are other tools that are attempting to provide, the OKR option, and the tool to this Rally integration is difficult. Rally will be more successful if they can enable the OKR capturing or recording process.

We want Rally to generate OKRs, to allow teams to record the OKRs, and then the OKRs can be mapped to the epics and there is organizational alignment. The organization can execute those objectives using the team's backlog.

I have been working with Rally Software for the last three years.

Rally Software, is a stable solution.

Rally Software is scalable but could be better.

When we try to generate some reports, it takes a long time to load due to the increased number of users.

We did not contact Broadcom directly because everything is handled by the admin team. Whenever we have an issue, we contact the admin team, who then communicates with Broadcom's technical support.

I'm a co-chair and I don't get involved with fixing Rally issues. We explained the Rally issues to the admin team, and they will most likely interact with Rally support to get it resolved.

We also have experience in Jira.

I am not involved with the initial setup. Once we have been given access it is easy to navigate.

There is a Rally admin team that will set it up for us and grant access.

I understand it's a little more expensive. That is why many people prefer Jira.

If they want to compete in this market, they have to price their products reasonably, they must understand the competitive pricing of licenses. I believe it is on the high side.

Given the industry and what is happening in the industry with more organizations attempting to become product-centric, Rally Software is definitely attempting to accommodate a lot of changes.

They should adopt the OKR.  In my company, for my client, we are attempting to implement OKR.

I would rate Rally Software a seven out of ten.