Thirdwave has worked carefully to keep our process as simple as possible.  The six primary phases of the development process that we employ are: discovery, planning, design, programming, testing and implementation.  Whether the timeline of a development cycle is two weeks or two years, we find that the first two phases can require up to two-thirds of the timeline. 

The discovery phase of our development process includes brainstorming (structured and free-form) and requirements gathering.  Brainstorming with our clients tells us what you want.  Requirements gathering tells us what you need.  While the latter sounds less than exciting, the end result of the development process depends on the details uncovered during requirements gathering. 

During the planning phase, we finalize the project timeline, including milestones.  Once the timeline is set, Thirdwave lays out the blueprints for the application: information architecture, system design and data schema.  We build the application on paper.  An application's information architecture is a road map for the pieces of an application and how they relate to one another.  System design incorporates detailing the functions an application must perform and laying out the user interfaces for each function as necessary.  We refer to the mock user interfaces as "wireframes".  The data schema is a detailed diagram of the application datasource, usually a database including tables, views (or queries), stored procedures, etc. 

Once we have the application blueprint, the programming phase begins and the application is built.  Thirdwave provides secure, online access for clients to monitor applications in the programming phase.  When all functionality is programmed, the application enters the testing phase.  During testing, a launch plan is set.  Thirdwave routinely tests all of our online applications for cross-browser and cross-platform performance issues.  Once the application has passed testing, the implementation phase begins, and the launch plan is executed.  The development process concludes with post-launch support consisting of reporting, backup, archiving and subscription service scheduling (e.g., Verisign).