Development Process

The consulting and planning stage lays the groundwork for everything else, and the first deliverable item is the site architecture. The architecture is an outline that is the direct result of the information-gathering process and defines how knowledge gained from this research is used to deliver the desired communications message(s). A well-structured architecture will enable team members from both the client and ddm to have a shared understanding of the site’s objectives and requirements.

An architecture defines the site map, navigational structure, and menu hierarchy for the entire site in a way that's easy to modify and update. Wireframes (interactive or a set of click-through images) show the same information in a way that we can all understand.

In the first stage of design, ddm will provide two to three multi-level design concepts to the client’s web development team. Close coordination and overlapping strengths between our designers and programmers ensure that each concept can be efficiently built according to project specifications. Two rounds of concept revisions based on the client feedback are considered a natural and expected part of the design process.

An interactive prototype completes the design stage and converts the approved design concept to static HTML pages, allowing all team members to view it "live" in their browser. Primarily focused on layout for they pages, the prototype is interactive, but not fully functional.

Initial planning and programming for an interactive project often overlaps the design phase. Analysis of information collected in the planning stage allows us to begin to accommodate content issues like common types of content (“typicals”) and anomalous content (“exceptions”), as well as process issues like workflow and authorization.

Each website project we work on has two major checkpoints during the programming stage: Alpha and Beta.

• Alpha
  Transfers the prototype to the final deployment system (e.g., as coded by a CMS or blog engine) in a development environment and real content (copy and imagery) is introduced. At this point, there are some targeted areas that will not be ready, but the bulk of the normal content will be in place and available for client review.
• Beta
  Assumes that virtually all content is in place and the project is 99% complete. Final approval is the last step before it's ready to be transferred to a live hosting environment.

In this stage of work, the completed website pages and components are migrated to the final hosting environment. Final functionality testing is performed to confirm consistent operation from the test environment to the live hosting environment and DNS records are updated to initiate the launch.