Software on over 1 million desktops worldwide: commercial
and custom
A Microsoft Gold Certified Partner
Can handle any size project
Reliable, robust and cool software
Located in Washington State
Cares about your satisfaction!
Full service software development shop
Satisfaction guaranteed
In business for over 13 years
Serving public, private and government sectors
No licensing fees
Countless satisfied clients
Tometa Software, Inc., offers software solutions and strategies
nationally through complex custom programming, consulting, and complete off-site
software development. Tometa remains tightly integrated with their client’s
IT staff and management while providing guaranteed software applications. The firm, headquartered in Eastern Washington
since 1990, works with both government and commercial organizations.
The software development process
Requirements In this phase, both consultant and client discuss the system to be developed.
We determine the minimal set of features to be supported (the "needs"),
as well as the ideal system desired (the "wants"). The reason it's important
to establish these priorities is that many projects are constrained by time; the
client has specific needs that must be met within a specific time frame. This
is often one motivation for breaking a large project into multiple development
cycles. High priority, mission-critical features can be implemented in earlier
phases, while desired but less essential features can be added in a later phase.
Consequently, once the requirements have been established and prioritized, an
initial timetable is determined.
Often the starting point in establishing requirements is a careful analysis of
the existing process which is to be automated. By examining the existing process,
we can fit the design to the way your business actually operates. Of course, this
examination also opens the possibility of modifying the business process to take
advantage of the way computers handle information. For example, you would only
need to enter data once, even though in a manual process it may need to be copied
several times. The key here is to remain flexible, and look for opportunities
to streamline certain tasks, without forcing you into any specific procedures.
One of the most powerful tools used in establishing requirements, particularly
user interface requirements, is prototyping. What that means is that the consultant
will create a dummy application that looks like the final product, but without
any of the business logic built in. This prototype is easy to build, and can usually
be done in a few days, even for larger systems. Its purpose is to allow the user
to see what the final product will actually look like, and get a sense of how
much data will fit on one window, how that data is organized, what steps are required
to perform specific tasks, and so on. What that means is that usability issues
are addressed early in the development process, while they're still easy to correct.
Analysis & Design
One of the most important steps, even though it's frequently ignored. It actually
consists of two steps. The first is to establish a high-level design that specifies
what the different parts of the system will be, and how they interrelate. During
this phase, decisions are made regarding what hardware and operating systems are
required, as well as what software tools will be used. User interface standards
are established based on the prototype discussed above, so that every window has
a consistent 'look-and-feel' in its presentation, and is consequently easier to
use.
The second part is a detailed specification of each business module, window, and
function within the system. A detailed database design, or schema, is also established
at this point. As with prototyping, performing a detailed design allows changes
to be made early, while it's still relatively easy. Done properly, this serves
as the foundation for the technical documentation of the system. It also serves
as a blueprint to guide the development phase. At this point, a firm timetable
can usually be established.
Note the distinctions between requirements gathering, analysis and design. Requirements
gathering refers to the task of identifying the business problem or need at hand.
Analysis refers to the task of understanding the business problem at hand. Design,
on the other hand, refers to the process of planning the solution to that problem.
Development
This phase is mostly self-explanatory, although it usually comprises the majority
of the project life cycle. Taking the design established in the previous phase,
the application itself is then built. As mentioned earlier, often the system is
built in multiple phases so that critical functionality can be deployed as early
as possible.
Testing
Even though it's listed as a separate phase, the bulk of the testing actually
occurs during the development phase. This first part is commonly known as unit
testing. Its goal is to make sure that the individual components of the system
work well, both separately and in conjunction with other parts of the system.
If done poorly, the user will later experience problems such as system crashes,
or poor performance. Done well, the user may not even be aware of this form of
testing at all.
The other type of testing is known as system testing. Its goal is to make sure
that the original requirements have been met, that the business rules embodied
in the system are correct, and to verify that the system works as a coherent whole.
This stage of testing is done in close coordination with the eventual users of
the system. This is another reason why it's important to have the participation
of the end users in gathering requirements. Typically, a limited-scale deployment
of the hardware and software is done in order to facilitate the testing. Often,
a new application will replace an existing one; in such a case, testing often
includes running both systems in parallel for a defined period of time.
Documentation
This is probably the most frequently forgotten step. Documentation serves two
purposes. Technical documentation is used as a guide for future developers to
make changes to a system months or even years later. Even the developer who designed
and wrote most of a system would be hard-pressed to remember every detail of its
implementation after a period of time. User documentation, on the other hand,
is the guide to using the system, as well as making the most of its features.
User documentation may come in different forms, from printed manuals to online
help files. While one of the goals of effective user interface design is to minimize
the need for user documentation by making the system easy and intuitive to use,
proper documentation is nonetheless important in training both current and new
staff in the use of the system.
Deployment
This is where it all comes together. Hardware is installed, and the network configuration
is established. Depending on the design of the system, database, application,
and web servers are installed on dedicated server machines. Existing data, if
any, is converted to the new system. The finished application is then installed,
and final testing is done to make sure that all of the pieces of the system are
working correctly in concert with one another.
