Web Application Development Process
If your company is developing web applications in-house or with the help of an outsourced development team, it is important to take some time to study this process.
As a company leader, you may be involved in developing a web application to assist your employees in performing various business functions such as marketing, collaboration, document creation, or to improve customer service quality. Whether you choose to work with an in-house team or turn to an outsourcing company like BairesDev, your project will be more successful if you understand in advance what the web application development process looks like.
As you probably know, web application development is important for businesses with different goals and needs, regardless of their specific field or niche. But first, it’s necessary to understand what a web application is, how it differs from other web projects, and why it is needed.
What is Web Application Development?
Web applications are interactive computer programs that store and manipulate data. Users access them through an internet browser, often via a login or registration mechanism, and then use them to perform a wide range of tasks such as customer management, accounting, shopping, or searching for information.
Successful web application development can transform not only your digital presence but your entire business.
Web Applications, Websites, and Progressive Web Applications
The web application development process, as you might imagine, is closely related to web development. However, the terms used to describe them—including websites, web applications, and progressive web applications (the newest of the three)—are actually quite different. Here we will look at their differences and characteristics.
Web Application
Features: Applications accessible from mobile and desktop devices, require authentication
Advantages: Responsive on any device, interactive elements, high browser capabilities, no download required
Disadvantages: Sometimes less secure, no push notifications, lower performance.
Website
Features: Consists of web pages with content
Advantages: Crucial for any business to have a digital presence, important for branding
Disadvantages: Cannot manipulate or modify data, user interface (UI) may be underdeveloped.
PWA
Features: Websites that look and feel like native apps, function without an internet connection, combine website and native mobile app
Advantages: No download required, can work offline, provide excellent user experience, run as fast as native apps, responsive, use push notifications, update in real time, generally secure, discoverable.
Disadvantages: Cannot access app stores, lower performance compared to native apps, difficult to use on older devices.
Now let’s look at the stages of web application development.
By understanding the stages described below and why developers use them, you can gain a useful “big picture” of web application development. You will have more control over projects and be able to provide developers with information and feedback as work progresses, leading to the best final products—strong, engaging, interesting, and appealing web applications.
#1 Definition and Planning
The first step in the web development process is to define the problem you want to solve with the web application and then gather the necessary information about it. A well-defined problem will set the right direction for the project and help find the optimal solution. This stage includes clarifying the purpose and final goals of the web application.
Remember: you don’t want to create a problem to solve with the web application. You need to identify an already existing problem, even if users are not yet aware of it. Your goal is to make their lives easier with your product.
Developers and their teams identify and study the target audience that you expect to use the application—this could be your employees or customers. If the target audience is employees, developers may involve them in the planning stage. Additionally, they can conduct competitive analysis to find existing applications targeting the same audience and ensure your application stands out.
During the planning stage of a web application development project, developers try to answer the following questions:
- What should the application do to solve the given problem?
- What capabilities and features will it have?
- What resources will be needed to build it?
At this stage, web application developers select appropriate tools, platforms, and frameworks—web technologies—to build the web application.
The tools must match the type and scale of the project, and their cost must fit the established budget. Developers will also work with you to establish realistic timelines and milestones for web application development.
#2 Design and Build
In the design stage, a wireframe or prototype is created to communicate the solution to target users. Developers embed elements that ensure a pleasant experience for that audience.
Then, developers present the prototype to potential users, record their feedback, and make adjustments until they are satisfied. The following video provides more detail about creating wireframes and how they fit into the web application development process:
Once the design is complete, it’s time to build the application. This stage will involve several steps:
- Database creation: Developers determine what data and data types are needed for the application to function properly and create a database to store them.
- Frontend development: Developers create the user-facing part of the application based on the elements approved by users during the wireframing process.
- Backend development: Developers build the interaction between the user and the server.
Developers can write code from scratch or use frontend and backend frameworks to build web applications. Understanding what each of these approaches is best for will help you better understand their choices.
Coding from Scratch
As you might guess, this means building web applications entirely from scratch, without using pre-built components or snippets in the web application development process. This approach to building web applications has both advantages and disadvantages:
- Provides the greatest flexibility
- Takes more time to complete
- Requires a high level of skill
Frontend Frameworks (JavaScript)
Frameworks can play an important role in web application development by speeding up the process, simplifying it, and improving other aspects of development. There are separate frameworks for the frontend—the part users see and interact with—and the backend, which is the internal workings of the web application.
React
React is a popular free, open-source JavaScript library released and maintained by Meta, formerly Facebook.
You may have noticed we said “library,” and that’s because React is essentially not a framework but a powerful library often referred to as a framework. Its main purpose is building interactive user interface components.
- Powerful library for building user interfaces
- Well-suited for large-scale projects
Vue
Vue is another JavaScript tool, but it is actually an open-source framework with a model-view-viewmodel pattern. Like React, it is used for building user interfaces and single-page applications and allows extending HTML with attributes called directives.
- Smaller and easier to learn than React
- Suitable for most projects
- Easy to integrate into a project
Svelte
Svelte is a compiler for JavaScript, not a framework. It is used to build “cybernetically enhanced web applications,” allowing developers to write less code.
- Compiler, not a framework
- Easiest to learn
- Well-suited for small to medium web applications
- Not yet well-proven for large applications
Backend Frameworks
Backend frameworks, like frontend frameworks, enable faster and more efficient web application development. Remember that backend refers to the server side, so these frameworks apply to the languages backend developers use to build the infrastructure of web applications.
Rails (Ruby)
Ruby on Rails, also called RoR or Rails, is one of the most popular web frameworks in the world. It’s rare to hear about Ruby without discussing this framework. It has gained immense popularity and has even influenced many other frameworks and libraries across various programming languages.
Here are just some use cases for Ruby on Rails: updating databases, supporting live web pages, and rendering HTML templates. But it has a vast number of use cases.
- Well-suited for metaprogramming and database-oriented web programming
- Suitable for small projects
Django (Python)
Django is called “the web framework for perfectionists with deadlines.” As a high-level Python web framework, Django enables rapid development. It also allows for less code and clean, simple design. It is free and open-source.
- Well-suited for scientific programming and data work
Laravel (PHP)
Laravel is “the PHP framework for web artisans,” offering an expressive syntax. A free, open-source framework, it is easy to use and offers many tools to support development.
- Offers authentication
- Strong security
#3 Testing and Deployment
Automated or manual quality testing of the web application is a continuous process throughout the software development lifecycle. The QA team checks functionality, usability, compatibility, security, and performance through rigorous tests aimed at eliminating bugs and ensuring smooth operation. Testing also identifies possible improvements and upgrades to be made in the future.
Once testing confirms the application works well, it can be deployed within the company or launched for customers. If the application is used internally, you can offer it to your employees and provide training on how to use it productively. For customer-facing applications, you need to develop a communication strategy and determine appropriate timing for market release.
#4 Host & Maintain
To set up a server for the application, you need to buy a domain and choose a hosting provider. You can choose shared hosting (server shared with other users), dedicated hosting (server entirely yours), or cloud hosting (a system of multiple connected servers).
Post-deployment maintenance of the application includes the following components:
- Continuous QA testing
- Bug fixing as issues are identified
- Adding new features based on user feedback
- Periodic updates and technical support.
What does each of these stages involve? Let’s look at them in more detail.
Continuous QA Testing
The QA process—from performance testing to functional testing—is never a one-time thing. It must be continuous because software and web development are constantly changing and evolving. Therefore, web developers must continuously collaborate with QA professionals to keep the application up-to-date and optimal.
Bug Fixing
During testing and analysis, QA specialists note any bugs and alert developers so they can fix them.
However, it’s important to remember that bug fixing is not all that QA specialists do. Their responsibilities include thoroughly testing a range of aspects of the web application, such as performance, usability, load and capacity, and much more.
Adding New Features
Features give a web application life. They turn it from a “bare” product into an attractive, dynamic product that users want to work with.
Before adding new features, the team should define the core features of the web application and determine what will contribute to improving and expanding the user experience. It is important to be mindful of feature bloat, which occurs when a development team adds a large number of features that only distract the user and reduce the overall appeal of the product. Instead, focus on the most important features and keep the application clean and easy to use.
The company budget also plays a role in determining which features can be included in the web application. Initially, you may only include the most important features, adding others in subsequent versions.
Periodic Updates
A web application is never truly complete. Due to the constantly changing nature of all technologies, the development team will need to regularly release new updates, fixing glitches and issues, security vulnerabilities, etc. They may also decide to redesign or otherwise modernize the web application to make it more current and appealing to attract more users and meet the needs of existing ones.
Study the web application development process before developers begin work
If your company is developing web applications in-house or with external contractors, take some time to study this process. If you understand the stages and why developers use them, you will know how and when to provide feedback to ensure the final product is a good fit.
Frequently Asked Questions About the Web Application Development Process
How to plan web application development?
Planning web application development involves many different steps. First, the development team must define the purpose of creating the product. Then, they need to conduct market research and competitive analysis to find out what products already exist. The next multifaceted step is planning the design and development of the product itself, including identifying key team members and their responsibilities.
How are web applications developed?
The web application development process includes a number of important stages and roles, including planning, market research, team formation, actual development, user experience (UX) design, testing, deployment, and maintenance.
What is the web application development lifecycle?
The web application development lifecycle includes several key stages before the final product is released to the market. These include:
- Ideation
- Planning
- Market research
- Coding
- UX design
- QA testing
- Product release/deployment
- Maintenance and updates
How to document the web application development process?
Documenting the web application development process involves carefully tracking the actions of developers and all team members, updating notes, and clearly describing stages, features, components, and other aspects of workflows.