Miscellaneous
Kanban Board (Todo / In Progress / Done)
A lightweight Kanban board with Todo, In Progress, and Done columns. Add cards, move them between columns, and organize your personal tasks - saved to localStorage.
To Do
0In Progress
0Done
0WIP limits
A WIP (Work in Progress) limit is the maximum number of cards allowed in a column at any time. When a column hits its limit, team members must help finish existing work before pulling in new tasks. This constraint:
- Reveals bottlenecks: a perpetually full column shows where work gets stuck
- Reduces multitasking and context switching
- Increases throughput by encouraging collaboration on blocked items ("stop starting, start finishing")
Common starting WIP limit: 2–3 cards per person per column.
Swimlanes
Swimlanes are horizontal rows that cut across all columns, grouping cards by category (e.g., customer type, project, priority, or team member). They let multiple streams of work share a single board while staying visually separate. Common swimlane groupings:
- Expedite lane (for urgent / P0 issues)
- Class of service (standard, fixed-date, intangible)
- Feature team or sub-team
Kanban vs. Scrum
| Feature | Kanban | Scrum |
|---|---|---|
| Work cadence | Continuous flow | Fixed-length sprints (1–4 weeks) |
| Change mid-cycle | Anytime | Not during sprint |
| Roles | None prescribed | Product Owner, Scrum Master, Dev Team |
| Commitments | WIP limits | Sprint goal |
| Metrics | Lead time, throughput, cycle time | Velocity, burn-down chart |
| Best for | Ongoing support, maintenance, continuous delivery | Feature development with defined scope |
What is Kanban?
Kanban (カンバン, Japanese: “signboard” or “billboard”) is a visual workflow management system originally developed at Toyota in the 1940s to improve manufacturing efficiency. David Anderson adapted it for software development around 2007, and it has since become one of the most popular project management frameworks.
Core principles
- Visualize your work: every task is a card on the board. Seeing all work at once reveals bottlenecks and workload imbalances instantly.
- Limit work in progress (WIP): each column has a maximum number of cards. Limiting WIP forces finishing tasks before starting new ones, reducing context switching.
- Manage flow: the goal is smooth, fast movement of cards from left to right, minimizing time tasks spend blocked or idle.
- Continuous improvement: regularly review where cards get stuck and adjust your process.
Typical columns
- Backlog: all tasks not yet ready to work on.
- To Do: tasks ready to start (the queue for the current period).
- In Progress: tasks actively being worked on (keep WIP low, typically 1–3 per person).
- Done: completed tasks.