Maybe you can ask a question - why should I need an analysis for my software project? Isn't it this the responsibility of the software author? Well, there is an analogy. If you want to build a house, you will also need a plans before you make a first dig in the ground. And usually, you want to know how the house will look like in advance and that is why you hire architects and engineers.
Well, with software it is the same.
Before you start a software project or before you ask somebody to make it for you, you will need a pretty good idea of what you expect of it. Who will be using it, what functionality should it have, what data will be inputed and what output are expected.
Sometimes, this might be quite challenging to communicate between the customer representatives and supplier employes. Mostly because the first ones are managers and the latter ones are IT proffessionals. Between those groups, the communication might be difficult. And that is why, all demands, expectations, interfaces, etc. should be identified and formulated into a written specification.
Based on this specification, a detailed analysis should be made by software architects, who will analyze all requirements in detail, identify and solve possible problems and sketch the system concepts. The analysis will also give answer to questions like what tools and technologies should be or is possible to use, what can be the project schedule, make better budget estimations, etc.
So, what can ARTIO offer you?
Specification Writing Assistance
Specification is something, that is given to software architects as input for their work. However, for a client that has no special IT knowledge, even writing a good specification might be difficult. We have experts, who can meet you and assist you on writing such document. You will need to bring in the ideas of what you want (or at least we will try to get this information from you), we will bring our expertise of how to structure the specification and checking that all important things have been remembered and are included.
The output of this phase is a written specification document.
Software Project Analysis
Ok, lets assume you have specification now. As a next level, you will want to know, how big the project really is, how much time it will take to implement it, what will be the costs and if all your requirements can be met.
To able to answer such questions, the analysis of all requirements and possible problems is needed. If the project is very complex, it may need splitting into smaller sub-projects ("divide and rule"). For each phase of the project, the need resources (people, time, money, tools, technologies) need to be identified and calculated.
The output of this phase is a written analysis document, which includes at least:
- detailed system description
- identification of project phases
- resource estimation
- time schedule
- identification of possible problems known at this stage and suggestion how to prevent them
- list and recommendations of technologies to be used
