Retrospective

From Encyclopedia Jr, free information reference for Kids

Retrospective (from Latin retrospectare, "look back") generally means to take a look back at events that already have taken place.

[edit] Arts

In a more specific sense, the term commonly refers to an exhibition of a selection of art work.

In visual arts, a retrospective is an art exhibition presenting the life work of an artist.

In film as an art form, a retrospective is a representative selection of films of a specific director, actor or other member of crew, or pertaining to a specific cinematic genre or era. Retrospectives are common part of film festivals, but may also be presented by local movie theaters.

[edit] Law

Laws may sometimes be deemed to apply retrospectively, see Ex post facto law.

[edit] Medicine

The term is also used in medicine, describing a look back at a patient's medical or lifestyle history.

[edit] Software engineering

The term is also used in software engineering, where a restrospective is a meeting held with a project team at the end of a project or process to discuss what was successful about the project, what could be improved, and how to incorporate the successes and improvements in future projects.

In software engineering, retrospectives have been made popular by Norm Kerth in his work on project retrospectives. Traditonal project retrospectives last several days and go over several retrospective exercises.

In Agile development retrospectives are also used and play a very important role in adapting the process. At the end of every iteration a retrospective should be held (called iteration retrospective) where the team asks the question: "What worked?" and "What do we want to do different?". Based on these questions they create concrete actions which they will do during the next iteration. This way the used software process will continuously and forever be improved.