Web Development for Business Users on Caktus Group

Prioritizing Defects

Mon, 30 Apr 2018 13:30:00 +0000

A defect, or bug, in a software product can be defined as a flaw in the system that leads to a measurable or observable deviation from its expected result. During development, it’s part of the quality assurance process to prioritize defects in order to minimize the impact to the end product and meet the agreed-upon quality level for the product. This prioritization can seem like a dark art. How do we decide what gets addressed and what doesn’t?

Agile for Stakeholders

Mon, 02 Apr 2018 13:30:00 +0000

In Agile development, a stakeholder is anyone outside the development team with a stake in the success of the project. If you are a stakeholder, knowledge of Agile will help you understand how the project will be developed and managed, when you can expect to see progress, and what the team needs from you in order to deliver their best work. Understanding these basic concepts and what your role entails are essential to your project’s success.

What is Software Quality Assurance?

Wed, 14 Mar 2018 13:30:00 +0000

A crucial but often overlooked aspect of software development is quality assurance (QA). If you have an app in progress, you will likely hear this term throughout the development life cycle. It may seem that coding is the brunt of the development work, since without code your app doesn’t exist, but quality assurance efforts often consist of up to 50% of the total project effort (1) (and part of the QA effort is coding). Without quality assurance, your app may exist but it is unlikely it will function well, meet the objectives of your users, or be maintainable in the future. QA is important, but what exactly is it?

Managing Sprint Reviews for Multiple Clients or Projects

Mon, 12 Mar 2018 13:30:00 +0000

Sprint reviews for teams working with multiple clients and managing multiple projects can be a challenge. At Caktus, we combine more traditional sprint review guidelines with some tweaks to fit our company and client’s needs.

Add Value To Your Django Project With An API

Mon, 19 Feb 2018 14:30:00 +0000

How do your users interact with your web app? Do you have users who are requesting new features? Are there more good feature requests than you have developer hours to build? Often, a small addition to your app can open the door to let users build features they want (within limits) without using more of your own developers’ time, and you can still keep control over how data can be accessed or changed. That small addition is called an application programming interface, or API. APIs are used across the web, but if you aren’t a developer, you may not have heard of them. They can be easily built on top of Django projects, though, and can provide great value to your own developers as well as to your users.

UX Research Methods 3: Evaluating What Is

Mon, 05 Feb 2018 14:30:00 +0000

In previous blog posts on UX research methods, I discussed techniques we use to understand how users think and feel, what they need and want, and why; and those we use to analyze and understand user behavior.

Caktus Discovery Workshops

Mon, 27 Nov 2017 14:30:00 +0000

Before an app can be built, the development team needs to know what they are supposed to be building. How do they establish that? With requirements gathering.

Getting Started with Outsourced Web Development

Mon, 13 Nov 2017 14:30:00 +0000

In researching outsourced web development, you may have come across a few different ways to get your project built and have some questions as a result. How well defined do the project requirements need to be prior to starting development? Will Waterfall or Agile methods deliver the best results? Should you look for a consultancy offering team augmentation or in-house Agile-based work? What are the ramifications for your project of picking one or the other?

From User Story Mapping to High-Level Release Plan

Mon, 31 Jul 2017 13:30:00 +0000

At Caktus, we begin many projects with a discovery workshop. A discovery workshop is an opportunity for our product team to get together with client stakeholders in order to answer three questions:

Is Django the Right Fit for your Project?

Mon, 24 Jul 2017 13:30:00 +0000

You need a website. You may have done some searches, and come back overwhelmed and empty-handed, having found hosting providers offering services that may have sounded familiar (“WordPress”) and ones that may have sounded like a foreign language (“cPanel”). You may have considered hiring someone to build your website, and gotten conflicting answers about what you need and what it would cost. You may have also heard about Django, but you’re not sure how it it fits into the picture and whether or not it’s the right fit for your project. This is common, because there are many different types of websites out there. To help answer the question of whether Django is the right fit for your project, let’s take a look at the landscape.

The Caktus Success Model

Wed, 21 Jun 2017 13:30:00 +0000

Here at Caktus, we’ve been fortunate to work on some incredible projects with our clients. For example, we built the world’s first SMS voter registration app for Libya, developed a digital archiving system for the world’s largest on-demand video provider, and created a survey tool with auto-scaling architecture to help the University of Chicago track school reform.

3 Reasons to Upgrade to the Latest Version of Django

Mon, 22 May 2017 15:30:00 +0000

When considering a website upgrade, many business stakeholders probably think about the frontend, i.e., how the website looks or the features users interact with. Perhaps less often considered is the importance of upgrading the backend; that is, the databases, applications, and servers powering all the behind-the-scenes activity. Infrastructure support and upgrades are necessary but often performed as a separate project from any improvements to design or user experience, rather than as part of a holistic update project.