Table of Contents
The custom development process starts with identifying project requirements by understanding exactly what problems you need to solve. Then you can move on to planning and designing an appropriate solution before it goes into the testing stages.
The custom development process begins by hiring an expert team of web or software developers (see Chapter III). They should understand how to interact with you as a provider and offer the technical skills to create a customer experience specific to your audience.
In custom development, project requirements are the roadmap and blueprint for the project. Without them, custom development teams would lack direction and be unlikely to create software solutions that meet expectations or work as desired.
Generally, custom development project requirements should include a detailed explanation of the following aspects:
Taking the time to fully understand a customer’s problems and needs is essential as it provides the clarity needed to make informed decisions throughout the custom development process.
With a clear understanding of the specific goals of your custom development project, the likelihood that the project is completed successfully increases dramatically.
Customer development projects require significant initial planning and design. Within the planning stage, there are several technical approaches for you to understand in order to select the best option for your specific business needs—and customers.
Using established development methodologies—such as Agile, DevOps, or Rapid Application Development (RAD)—the custom development team can create holistic plans customized for the specific project parameters that outline the scope, timeline, resources, and objectives of the respective custom development project.
Agile divides the functionality of custom development into sections that can be rapidly produced and deployed while incorporating a feedback loop to address any flaws or defects as they appear.
This is another methodology in which projects are handled in linear subsequent phases. Each next phase is dependent upon the previous phases’ deliverables being completed and ready for the next processes — building momentum in a downward movement.
For more information on choosing the best approach for your project, please continue to section IV of this guide.
Development and Testing
Going into the development and testing stage, both custom web development and custom software development require careful consideration of several factors.
Developers should work with you in order to identify project requirements, plans, and designs accordingly. Then, they need to test the product before it can be deployed.
Important factors during this stage include:
Time for launch! When the development process is complete, you need to focus on overseeing the deployment and maintenance of your project.
After launch, you should decide whether or not you should hire an in-house developer(s), keep the same development team who built the product, or outsource the maintenance of the product to a specialized development agency. The following chapters explain the process for making these important decisions.
Essential Elements to Launch and Maintain Your Custom Solution
Aside from personnel, the deployment and maintenance stage of a custom development project is where the product goes live in order to be used by its intended users.
Tasks to focus on here include:
Establishing security protocols to protect the product, its users, and your business from external attacks and potential internal vulnerabilities should also be clearly defined at this stage. Ask the developers to describe how and why they made each security-related decision.
The overall system performance must also be monitored closely in order to ensure it meets user expectations and performance criteria — and to avoid costly downtime.
Next up, contingency plans should be prepared in case of unforeseen downtime or other events do occur that impact or disrupt normal usage or operation of the product.
Finally, the development team needs to provide detailed documentation that includes cogent details on how to deploy, maintain, and secure the product. This documentation is also necessary in case there is ever a need for future modifications or fixes.
To summarize, important factors throughout the stage include:
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This page last updated on March 15, 2023 by Credo Team
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