Technical Build and Testing

Once the requirements have been established and clarified in detail during the analysis phase we are then in a position to produce technical designs and implement them. Our development methodology is called Feature Driven Development which breaks a project down into Features which are then delivered iteratively in interdependent groups called Feature Sets. This facilitates a truly user-led approach and makes it easy and flexible to plan, prioritise and monitor. Once the first Feature Set is delivered then development, functional testing and user testing can all run in parallel reducing the overall project timeline and facilitating the capture of important issues early in the project lifespan.

The aim of each Feature Set is to deliver a subset of functionality that can be tested by users during User Acceptance Testing (UAT). For larger projects training is usually given iteratively based on each Feature Set that is delivered. It is important that all elements of the project are tested including editorial and back-end processes as early as possible. Training is always hands-on and aims to give users a comprehensive understanding of the system so that they can take the level of ownership required and be confident that they are signing off a system that they can use effectively.

Migrations can be a complex operation in terms of getting the data into the right format, rectifying poor quality content and coordinating with other project activities and deadlines. We plan our migration to run alongside each Feature Set delivery to facilitate functional testing and UAT and to sanity check that a Feature Set really is complete without further rework due to issues thrown up by migration issues.