Oaks|Design embraces the industry standard, Rational
Unified Process (RUP). RUP is a complete software development process
framework developed by Rational SoftwareŽ. It is an iterative process
that is "use-case driven, risk driven, and architecture driven."
RUP embodies a few important philosophical principles: a software project
team should plan ahead; it should know where it is going; it should
capture project knowledge in a storable and extensible form. RUP also
incorporates the concept of "best practices" for software engineering,
defined by five major properties:
- Use case driven—Guided by interactions between the system and
its users.
- Architecture centric—Founded on a defined architecture, with clear
relationships among the architecture components.
- Iterative—The problem and solution are organized into small pieces,
so each iteration purposely addresses only one of those pieces.
- Incremental—Each iteration builds incrementally on the foundation
built in the previous iteration.
- Controlled—Control with respect to process means you always know
what to do next; control with respect to management means that all
deliverables, artifacts, and code are under configuration management.
Does Oaks|Design apply the complete RUP to every project? Of course
not. This would, in most cases, impose an undue burden on the client
with insufficient benefit. Instead, Oaks|Design applies a subset of
the RUP to each project in accordance with various technical and non-technical
factors. And, regardless of a project's characteristics, Oaks|Design
upholds the core RUP principals.
In particular, we adhere to the fundamental property of RUP—its iterative
nature. An iterative process is incremental (relatively small tasks)
and cyclical (frequent checkpoints). Iterative development minimizes
client risk and builds confidence in the client/consultant relationship.
It does so without significantly impeding the pace of the project—indeed,
it often saves time by avoiding costly missteps.
Iterative processes are honest. We acknowledge that we cannot understand
everything at a given point in time; instead, we accumulate knowledge
over time, continually revisiting areas we have been to before while
delivering real value to the client at every step along the way. |
