Notes

This article series describes the 7 crucial Stages of the Mobile App Development <https://antiguawebsolutions.com/app-development-companies-newyork/> Process in 2021, from a business perspective. It really is an essential guide for current and future app owners.

What are the stages of the app development process? How does a mobile app development process look like? How to start the development process of my application? If you are thinking about developing an app, these will be the questions you’re probably thinking about right now. This article is a guide for current and future app owners who wwill beh to kright now - step-by-step - how their product will undoubtedly be created.

What are the stages of the app development process?

In short, a mobile app development process consists of the following stages:

STAGE 1. Choosing a partner - decide on a company to design and develop your app

Decide if you want to build your app in-house, or outsource its development. This article can help you: Inhouse vs. outsourcing software development
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> . If you opt to outsource your product creation, you should know how to choose a proper app development company for the project. How to verify in case a company you wish to select, is trustworthy? We recommend you to:

• Use Clutch.co or other platforms for B2B buying

Clutch.co, AppFutura, GoodFirms, ContractIQ - use platforms that will help you to create an initial selection of companies that satisfy your desires.

• Analyze pre-selected companies

Check opinions about them, and also their portfolio. Ask questions like:

o Do they have experience in creating products similar to yours?

o Did they work with partners from many countries and different industries?

o Do they work with start-ups, big companies… or both?

o Do they use new solutions and technology?

• Analyze the estimations you obtain

It is worth to get estimations from more than one company and compare them. If you get two totally different estimations, it is really worth checking how each team made their respective figure.

o Did you deliver the same information and documentation to both companies?

o Ask the companies on which assumptions they based their forecasts. Does the lower estimation contain all the crucial elements included in the higher one?

o Did they ask questions to learn more about your app idea?

o Does the estimation contain the time for team meetings?

o Does the estimation contain the time for Quality Assurance (e.g. writing tests)?

o Did the companies take into account the risk of unforeseen events?

o If your app’s design demands some nonnative solutions, is this considered in the estimation?

o If your product is a typical kind of app, like e-commerce or m-commerce, but you want it to possess some untypical features, check if indeed they have been considered in the Estimations.

Read also: How much does it cost to build up an app?

• Make sure the code will undoubtedly be written in English

• Make sure the code will undoubtedly be hosted on Code Repositories Hosts

E.g. App development agency , GitHub, so you can have access to the code and become sure that it is safely stored.

• Verify the Independent Contract Agreement

Verify the contract you obtain carefully and make sure to consult a lawyer about it. Below, we’ve listed for you personally a few important elements that should be contained in an agreement. We are not writing about some obvious elements, like personal data of parties, but instead factors more specific to software usually houses.

o Confidentiality: Make sure that the contract contains a clause about confidential information. Your partner should commit himself or herself to not disclosing any information about your project that is not public yet. -&gt; Download free of charge your Printable NDA (PDF)
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o Intellectual property: You should have the rights to everything the software house produces. The contractor shall execute and deliver such further instrument(s) and take such action(s) as may reasonably be required to complete the assignment of intellectual house rights in the Deliverables to Company’s sole and exclusive ownership.

o Choice of Law: The contract should indicate a dispute resolution place. That is especially important if the sassociated withtware house is from another country. Probably, your partner will want to choose the judiciary of hwill be country. We would recommend compromising and choose the laws of a different country, with the jurisdiction you understand, e.g. thelectronic United Kingdom.

o Advance payment: We recommend that the advance transaction should not exceed the cost of the team’s work for one month. In the event a contractor must incur significant expenditure (e.g. for hardware or licenses) at the beginning of the project, a higher advance payment could be reasonable.

o Payment deadline: The contract should regulate the consequences of delays in payments. What is the acceptable delay? After how many days will interest be charged? After just how many days can the development team stop work? Unlike appearances, such a clause secures you.

o Conditions for terminating the contract: It is safe to set a notice period of about 15-20 days.

o Deadlines:

&sect; Time &amp; Material - in this type of contract, there is no need to specify a precise deadline. You decide when the app is ready. Your Feedback after every iteration can be implemented updated.

&sect; Fixed Price - the contract contains a schedule of partial deliverables. What is more, it will be worth setting the time for you to give feedback for each and every iteration, as well as for the team for implementing that feedback.

In this article - -Mobile App Development Process Stage 1. Choosing a Partner - you will find examples of contractor agreement fragments that should be included in your contract. Read also: -Time &amp; Material vs Fixed Price Comparison for App Owners
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> .

-&gt; Download for Free your Printable nondisclosure Agreement (NDA) Template

Let’s sum up Stage 1 of the mobile app development process:

STAGE 2. Product Discovery - define what you need to generate, for who and why

Before you start your mobile app development process, it’s necessary to clarify your app’s vision - we call this phase Product Discovery

. This is actually the key to your app’s success. The foundation of Product Discovery is really a constant testing of solutions and ideas, along with learning how exactly to adapt them to the user’s needs. It also ensures that not only you are aware of the end-users’ requirements, however your development team knows your targets and can deliver your ideas.

Here are the following areas you should focus on during Product Discovery:

• Establishing a strategy. What's your goal? What outcome do you wish to achieve?

• Targeting potential users and their problem. Who's the user? What type of problems do they will have? How can we help them?

• Ideating solutions. How will you solve the problem? What will function as outcome of such a solution? What is the very best answer?

• Prototyping. What is my user’s experience? Do I love the solution?

• Reviewing ideas. Are your suggestions good enough? What do my users think about them? Can I really solve their problems?

• Narrowing down the solutions. Which ideas are we likely to implement?

• Prioritization. Which features will be the most crucial in the app? Do you know the functions to be implemented first?

• Planning. What is the scope of our MVP (Minimum Viable Product) ? How do i measure the end result to find out if the goal has been met?

In this article , you can read more detailed description of each of the above-mentioned Product Discovery elements.

You can find the answers by yourself, with your team, or throughout a Product Design Workshop organized by another app development company - it’s your decision.

The recommended tools that will help you to clarify the idea of your app are Product Canvas (PDF print Personas (PDF print
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> ), Event Storming, User Journey Map, and Prioritization Chart. You could find a description of all of these tools in this post: -Mobile App Development Process Stage 2. Item Discovery

If you already know the answers, and your vision is clear, this is great! Yet it’s simply not enough to possess them in your mind. Write them down and confront them with others - talk to people from your team, employees, or simply your friends. They should know very well what it is about.

How about starting development without clarifying your vision? Product Discovery is an optional process but would it make sense to start costly development without thorough research? In the Theory of Quality Management, we've the “1:10:100 rule”, which states that prevention will be cheaper than correction, and correction is cheaper than failure. Item Dwill becovery costs you nothing in comparison to releasing an useless application.

In short, Product Discovery is the app development phase where we are focused on building the right thing, as opposed to creating the thing correct.

Please note: it’s worth to consider leal and security issues at this stage. Read more:

• 5 Key Legal Issues to take into account in your App Development within 2021 • What is Mobile (and Web) App Security? | Introduction for App Owners Let’s sum up Stage 2 of mobile app development process::


STAGE 3. UX / UI app design - determine how your app will continue to work and look

Let’s start with an expla goodation, what do UX and UI mean. To put it simply: UX (User Experience) is how an app works UI (User Interface) is certainly how it looks. Well designed UX and UI have become important from a business viewpoint. At the end of the day, they influence the retention rate. If your apps’ user experience will be enjoyable and flawless, and the look of the app will generate a positive impression on its users, they'll think it’s great, and use it.

This stage of mobile app development process includes creating:


User Journey Map

You (alone or with your development team) create an User Journey Map. This is a visualization of the user flow through your app. It tells the stor eveny of the consumer’s experience. At Droids On Roids, User Journey Map takes the proper execution of the drawn schema on the wall (we wrote about it here ), or we draw it using Figma It is almost always a part of Project Discovery, but we present it here showing you that's crucial to create wireframes and user interfaces.

Wireframes (UX)

Designers create Wireframes - digital, simplified visual concepts of the future app. They construct the structure, hierarchy, and relationship between the elements that make up the product. This is a kind of app’s backbone.


Then, designers use Wireframes to produce a Clickable Prototype - a dynamic, interactive model of your app. It simulates a real-world product. An example of a Clickable Prototype:

Design (UI)

Designers work on the visual language of one's app, its style guide, User Interface, and motion design. You obtain mockups showing the final look of one's app, and videos presenting motion design (animations &amp; screen transitions) in your app.

To sum up, even if your app idea is great, but its interface and UX design will undoubtedly be of low quality, you won’t succeed. Make sure that the UX and UI Design processes run in a thoughtful way. Be engaged in each stage of styleing your product, therefore the team can shape the ultimate designs according to your expectations. And last, however, not least - remember to put your app’s users in the heart of your thinking.

STAGE 4. Project kick-off &amp; setup - last preparations prior to the start of app development

App Development Kick-off has a significant influence on the successful cooperation with your software partner. In short, it’s time and energy to define your role as a Product Owner and to clarify every part in the team. What is more, Project Kick-off means also setting the rules you intend to follow, and planning the next steps. Kick-off may have different forms, at Droids On Roids we organize a Kick-off meeting with every client (remote, or face-to-face), it requires around 2 hours. An example of how kick-off may look:


When App Development Kick-off is completed, the first Sprint starts. It is also the moment when developers create your project.

How do the developers set up your project?

These 6 elements are specific for mobile app development, however in the case of web apps, they look similar (with the exception of the 3rd point).

• Creating a repository for the project at GitHub or another web-based hosting service. This means crefroming a space dedicated to your project on the cloud-hosted platform, where all versions of one's code will be safely kept and archived.

• Continuous Integration setup. Every new little bit of code needs to be checked before it is merged into the project. It’s examined manually, but additionally with automated tests run by special platforms like Bitrise, CircleCI, or Jenkins. The procedure of automating the build and testing the code every time a team member commits changes is called Continous Integration. The next role of CI platforms is pushing the app versions to Google Play / Apple Store and allowing running assessments by users. At Droids On Roids, we use Bitrwill bee
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> .

• Setup of the beta distribution tool on the CI platform. App Center, Fabric - they are a few examples of devices that enable you to collect live crash reports, get feedback from your own app’s users, or distribute your betas. To state simply - they look after the grade of your product.

• Choosing a code architecture, libraries &amp; SDKs. Developers pick the program code architecture for your project (e.g. MVP
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> , MVVP, VIPER, MVC, Clean Swift). Code architecture could be compared to the construction of a building. It isn't visible outside when the creating is finished, nonetheless it decides about the shape of the thing and its’ solidity.

• What is more, developers choose also libraries &amp; SDKs (Software Development Kits) which they use in your project. In other words, SDK will be a set of software development tools useful within app development. Read also: Benefits and drawbacks of Using Third-Party Software in Your App Development
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> .

• Setup project in IDE (Integrated Development Environment). Developers setup your task in a program that they will use to write the code - e.g. Android Studio
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> for Android Apps, or XCode
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> for iOS Apps. To the system, they add also outside SDKs or libraries that can help them to optimize their work.

• Register the app in Google Play Console, Firebase API Console, along with other services if needed. If your app will use some third-party components (e.g. Google Maps, push notifications), it should be registered on the suppliers’ solutions.

Get our -Free Guide for Product Owners Drive your Product to Success
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> .

Let’s sum up Stage 4 of the mobile app development process::


STAGE 5. App development with Quality Assurance

That’s the phase, where developers start to write the code and produce your product. Just how do they do that? Mobile app development is an iterative process. You have probably heard the word Sprints or Scrum
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> . This basically implies that you break up all development work into smaller milestones and develop your mobile app in a series of cycles. Each cycle includes refinement, planning, createment, testing, review, and retrospective.

Refinement

Sprint Refinement (Product Backlog Refinement) may be the act of keeping the backlog updated, clean, and ordered. A backlog can be an ordered list of everything that is known to be needed in the product. Refinement ought to be an ongoing process. However, it really is useful to have a planned meeting for Refinement.

For example at Droids On Roids, we discuss the tasks from the top of the Product Backlog, making sure that their acceptance criteria are clear, and estimating them. Then, during the Planning Meeting, there's less to review, and planning is simpler.

Only the first Sprint starts with Refinement - we need to prepare backlog before the 1st Planning. Later, every Sprint begins with the Planning meeting.

Planning

Sprint Planning is max. 2 hours meeting (for 1-week Sprint). Its’ goal would be to decide which tasks should be included in the upcoming Sprint. The team talks concerning the things to do, making sure that the acceptance criteria for each task are clear and accepted by everyone. THE MERCHANDISE Owner (you) joins this conference (for instance on Skype) so she or he takes part actively in planning another iteration.

Coding

Developers are writing the code and implementing the features planned for the Sprint, QA Engineers are composing automated tests. It’s good when developers practice Code Review. Code Review isn't necessary for developing a crash-free app but it is a good exercise if you want your app to have code written in a clear and transparent way, so in the future other developers can easily enhance the app and continue focusing on the code.

Testing (QA)

During development, we work with a platform called AppCenter. It we can privately and securely distribute the in-advancement version of the app to testers, clients, along with other developers. The system automatically notifies users of new builds (so many people are testing the latest version), provides crash reporting and ensures only approved testers have access to your app.

Quality Assurance (or simply QA) is really a way of preventing mistakes in developed applications and avoiding problems when delivering them to users. It really is integrated into every stage of development. That is an example of how Quality Assurance could be incorporated into the app development process:


1. Coding - developer writes the code, QA specialist writes automated tests.

2. Pull Request - developer tells others in regards to a new section of the code.

3. Execution of automated tests - automatic tests that check whether new changes didn’t break any already implemented functionalities. It includes:

o Static Code Analysis - a code is checked by a special program (Lint, Sonar), which verifies if the code meets the good standards set by our development team.

o Executing Unit Tests - automated tests that validate if each unit of the software performs as designed.

o Executing UI Integration Tests - automated tests that check if the app components are correctly integrated.

o Virtual Device Testing - we use it to find crashes in Android apps. It simulates a real app user.

4. Code Review - every little bit of code written by one developer is approved at the very least by 1 another dev.

5. Deployment - the latest alpha/beta release is sent to the client and testers.

6. Manual Tests - manual testing of the app predicated on specified use cases. Created by QA specialists.

7. The feature is performed

The process is repeated often during development. Read also: Mobile Security Testing. Make step one!
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Below you can find a listing of good practices in Quality Assurance that people recommend you to consider while dealing with an outsourced development team:

• First, make sure that your partner has Quality Assurance engineers who'll look after the highest product quality at every development stage.

• The development team should have a dedicated specialist who will ensure QA for the project holistically. Why? He will possess a map of the whole task in his mind. For work hygiene, pair-testing is okay, but frequent changes of testers carry the chance of mess and chaos in the project.

• You are not the main one who should pick up basic errors and differences between what's in the requirements and everything you got.

• Developers are not testers. Your lover says that they don’t have a Quality Assurance specialist, nonetheless it is OK because a developer will test the app? Well, not really exactly. A programmer who wrote the code shouldn’t check hwill be own work. It is harder for an author to see their own mwill betakes. What is more, developers can consider something not as a mwill betake since they understand what they have written. A supplementary pair of eyes is definitely helpful.

• QA should be ensured from the very beginning. Don’t put QA off until later. Even small errors in the early stages of development can cause more complex complications in the future. The sooner you start with QA, the fewer troubles you will have in the foreseeable future.

• You should have insight into the output of the tests. Which features possess been tested so far? What bugs have been found? As an app owner, you should possess insight into testing progress. There are lots of tools that can be used to easily track and follow the status of tests, e.g. Testlink , QA touch, TestRail, or Jira.

• The tests should be operate on different types of devices because your product should work perfectly not merely on one type of smartphone. A great solution is Smartphone Test Farm (STF) - it really is an app that allows developers to:

o control and manage real-time testing on many devices remotely from their workplaces

o run automated tests using dedicated software like Bitrise
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> that enables testing apps on many devices simultaneously.

•


STF in action

Review

During the Sprint Review, the particular Scrum Team and stakeholders collaborate about what was done in the Sprint. A Sprint Review is held at the end of the Sprint to inspect the Increment (all tasks completed during the Sprint). It requires up to 1 hour in the event of a 1-week Sprint. An excellent practice is if, after Evaluation, your development team send you:

• An app demo build (so you can check if the created app fits your expectations)

• A detailed review of what’s been done

• Information about eventual difficulties or additional work that is done

• Information about how several hours the team worked on the project through the Sprint

According to the PO’s preferences, he or sthis individual can take part in the Review meeting, or simply get the above-mentioned information having an E-mail.

Retrospective

Retrospective meeting (about 45 m for 1-week Sprint) occurs usually following the Sprint Review. During this meeting, you and the team plan together methods to increase product quality by improving its’ work processes. The objective of the Sprint Retrospective would be to:

• Inspect how the last Sprint went in relation to people, relations, process, and tools

• See what went well and define potential improvements

• Create a plan for implementing improvements

Please read the whole article describing app development with Scrum
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> - and learn Scrum Sprint Workflow with all Scrum events.

To sum up this stage - all features are firstly planed, then implemented and tested while the Continous Integrations process, where Quality Assurance is integrated at every step, in the end, they are accepted by the Product Owner. The complete application is built in this way - in repeated cycles - of planning, coding, and testing, reviewing, and improving the procedure and the product. This process gives you great flexibility - it creates it easier that you should monitor the procedure, the item, and introduce changes easily.

STAGE 6. Preparation and publishing of the app on Google Play Store and Apple Store

When the first version of your mobile app is ready, it is time to publish it. Your partner should assist you to upload your Android app on the Google Play Store, as well as your iOS app on the Apple Store. Additionally it is a part of the application development process. The business should guide you through the app setup on the stores concerning the marketing materials, description, and legacy issues.

Google Play

Releasing includes gathering &amp; uploading promotional materials (like graphics, videos), configuring options, and uploading assets required for legal reasons (like privacy policy, geographic and/or age restrictions, pricing), and continuous deployment configuration (this part is optional but recommended). The last step is publwill behing the release version of one's app.

• Read more: -How to publish an App on Google Play Guide for App Owners
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> written by our Android Developer with a decade of experience.

• Download for free: App Publishing Checklist for Google Play (Printable PDF)
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Apple Store

The first step would be to fill in the basic information regarding the app on the Product Page, such because the app’s name, icon, description, keywords, and online privacy policy. If your app supports Dark Mode, consider including at least one screenshot that showcases what the knowledge looks like for users.

Then, developers upload the build of your app using Xcode
<https: developer.apple.com="" code="" /> . The app might then get tested using the TestFlight
<https: antiguawebsolutions.com="" pp-development-companies-newyork="" /> tool. The same build of the app that was tested can be after that assigned to a specific version of one's app. The next step is to upload screenshots of one's app taken on different devices, fill in all the missing legal information, and submit the app for review. Apple employees will test thoroughly your app and see whether it complies with the guidelines of the App Store. This may take around 2 days.

Read our step-by-step Guide on How to Publish your own iOS App on the App Store
<https: www.thedroidsonroids.com="" log="" ow-to-submit-app-to-the-app-store-guide-and-checklist="">
.

STAGE 7. Post-development phase - app maintenance &amp; further development

During app maintenance, the development team implements app monitoring tools (e.g. Crashlytics, Google Analytics, Firebase) to your product. Thanks to these tools team can detect any crashes, follow app’s statistics, and plan product enhancements. The post-development phase includes also further development of one's product - it allows your app to remain attractive, adapt to changing market conditions, and users’ feedback.
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