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In web development, design and programming merge more and more as mobile, internet delivery, and data technologies advance. While keeping in mind the continual blurring of traditional technology lines (programming, design, hardware, PC, big data, etc.), here are some development trends to watch in the coming years.

1. Continued Development of Web-Based Programming - One of Info World's hot topics for the year, technological advancements have made it practical to create fully functional apps to be delivered via a web-browser. This reduces OS specific programming costs, and the marketing issues faced with various app marketplaces.
2. Big Enterprise Goes Open - "Just one day after Big Data firm Pivotal Software Inc. revamped its business model and open sourced core technologies," Microsoft Azure announced an open source integration to be used on Linux. Microsoft follows Google's Android which is leading the way. Today, watch for innovative ways open source technologies are going to be integrated with enterprise systems.
3. Data Management - With the last holiday season's queuing issues, data speed in web development is once again a significant issue.
4. Simplified Designs - With mobile development increasingly using websites over apps, web based applications need to be simple and easy to use. Modern trends are to use less color, less images and longer pages to produce aesthetically pleasing, minimalist designs.
5. Agile Development - According to TechRadar, a trend continuing to grow in 2015 is agile development processes. In the past, software development teams spent intense amounts of time building the foundations of their programs, then they worked on the functional aspects. With so much open source or cheap programming frameworks available, programming and design teams are using agile to cheaply and efficiently produce programs.
6. Smart Production Will Slow - With high-turnover technological products already integrated in the mobile-web driven world, new "smart" products will slow as they are worked into long-lived product cycles, according to Web Designer Depot.
7. Increasing Screen Diversity - As companies are releasing watches, glasses, and more wearable technology, interfaces are getting increasingly complex. Web development will increasingly use Responsive Design to optimize across multiple platforms.
8. Single Page Applications - To reduce screen problems, to manage data, and to simplify the user experience, single page web applications will become more common.
9. Data Processing on the Front End - Web applications have traditionally done most of their processing via servers. As more content is delivered via browser based programs, responsive programming languages take away the heavy lifting from the server and rely on each user's processing capabilities. This presents businesses the opportunity to develop large systems without extensive server presences.
10. Images are Big - When Grace and Lace appeared on ABC's Shark Tank, none of the sharks could believe a company could have pulled in as much money as they did off socks, with minimal advertising. Until the owner said her photograph was one of the most shared pictures on Pinterest. One well-done image can make a company, and with high definition screens the standard for mobile technology, expect high quality images to continue to be a part of web design and development.
11. Continued Use of Games - Many apps have been using the functionality, feel, and reward/consequence aspects of the gaming universe, even when creating serious commercial software. With online gaming itself becoming a huge industry, organizations will continue to use the feel of games to increase marketing of their web programs.
12. Cloud Infrastructure - The cloud is not just changing the way we access data, it is changing the way we think about information and business processes. Web design and development will include increasingly more powerful apps as high speed fiber connections, cloud hosting services, and colocation providers bring big data closer to consumers. These data processes will change the way businesses access data: employees anywhere, management everywhere, and systems available for any constituent.

We offer web development, creative processes, app management and software engineering services using Agile processes. Please contact us for more information about keeping your web development current. 

If you've heard of the agile process, you've probably heard about it's value in developing quality software, but you may not actually know what it is or how to implement one. Simply put, agile software is a dynamic, iterative and collaborative approach to developing software. Rather than a linear line of development that is static and uncompromising (known as Waterfall), the agile process is a responsive approach that operates within the framework of your business plan or goal. It values individuals or teams who interact and collaborate over fixed processes and tools.

The agile process is based upon ceaseless and incremental development, within certain time periods called sprints.

This article answers what is a sprint in Agile development and why are they important for your business.

Sprints

Sprints are one of the methods used in agile software development. The purpose of a sprint is for a team to develop demonstrable software under time constraints. The Product Owner alongside teams, decide what will be achieved and when it will be achieved by. Due to this time limit, software has only the most essential functionality and features.

Traditionally, scrum sprints were a month-long. However, team's today prefer shorter sprints taking only one to two-weeks. Always consider the length of the project to determine a sprint’s time-frame. Shorter projects call for short sprints. Also, if there are any new team members, they’ll adapt quicker to the regular meeting process if sprint’s are shorter.

Every team member should complete their task within the allocated time. The first sprint should set the tone for the rest of the scrum process, as well as determine which teams do what.

Sprint Meetings

During the sprint, there are 4 kinds of meetings:

• sprint planning
• daily stand ups, or Scrums
• sprint review
• sprint retrospective

First, there's a sprint planning meeting. It’s done at the start of each sprint and requires user stories to be prioritized. The Product Owner discusses with the teams which user stories will be accepted, how many, and the tasks needed to complete them.

Basically, sprint planning determines what will be done, and how it will get done. It’s important teams agree on the work they'll do and not go too deeply into the stories.

After the meeting is finished and the work decided, the Product Owner cannot add anything extra. However, it is possible the latter can cancel a Sprint, but this shouldn't happen often unless there is sudden change in business needs.

Scrum Meetings

During the sprint, team members host daily Scrum meetings. These meetings should last no longer than 15 minutes. Use a project wall and have your team stand up in-front of it.

Each team member should talk about their work and progress, answering:

• What they did yesterday
• What they’re doing today
• and, about any barriers that are getting in their way

It’s important the Scrum is kept brief. However, make sure each team member sufficiently answers all the questions.

Review and Retrospective

The sprint concludes with the sprint review meeting, in the same way it began with the sprint planning meeting. The teams present their work to the Product developer. Stakeholders can be present, and if necessary, teams can explain which stories haven’t been finished and why.

From there, the teams discuss what worked, what didn't, and what can be improved. This is called the sprint retrospective meeting.

The Benefits of Sprints

Sprints foster teamwork and collaboration. Because everyone is involved, there is a shared commitment for the work. A report conducted by Frost & Sullivan found that companies which invested in collaboration technology and strategies had a 400% return on investment.

This collaborative note rings throughout the entire Agile process. Barriers are removed and title and job descriptions are left outside. Cohesive teams are working together to develop the most valuable product with the least time to market.

The sprint process also allows the Product Owner to properly articulate software requirements and discuss openly with the team to clear up any ambiguities. If done correctly, the sprint will get it right the first time.

However, it's important that the Product Owner during a sprint encourages developers to focus on short-term goals. This provides customers with a tangible taste of progress and what's to come. Though software release may require many sprints, each iteration builds off prior work, ensuring its success in the market.

To learn more about sprints or the agile process, and how it can benefit your business, contact us and talk with one of our professionals.

The myriad of mobile platforms has posed a significant hurdle for web developers and businesses. The iPhone, Blackberry, Android, netbook, and Kindle each come with their own screen resolutions and orientation; thus, websites need to be compatible with every new device. Yet not adapting to these new screen resolutions and interfaces loses customers and diminishes your business's visibility in the market.But making a new website for each new device is time-consuming, costly, and impractical.

Responsive web design adapts to the environment and user behavior. Using a range of flexible grids and layouts, a responsive web page adapts on account of screen size, platform, and device orientation.

For example, depending on the user's device, the website adapts automatically and adjusts screen resolution and scripting abilities. Websites are now automatically responding to a user's preferences, eliminating the cumbersome need of different designs, code scripting, and for the multitude of devices.

Adjusting Screen Resolutions

The majority of new smartphone devices come with different screen sizes, functionality, and color tones. For example, the iPad can switch sizes instantly from landscape to portrait, depending how a user holds their phone. This requires a web page to adapt instantly to each orientation. But hundreds of different sizes exist and more are coming, making it impossible to accommodate them all. Responsive Web Design makes everything more flexible - images adjust automatically, screen resolutions fit the device, and web layouts never break.

Grids, Images, and Queries

Creating responsive websites requires three aspects that fit together to make the whole of responsive design. They are:

• Fluid grids
• Fluid Images
• Media Queries

Traditionally, websites were measured in pixels, but these fixed units failed to adapt to different sized screens. Responsive websites, however, are built with relative units such as percentages, which effectively transitions the webpage size to adjust to hundreds of screen resolutions from a variety of devices.Images that don't shrink within the confines of the fluid grid, appear too large, small, or break entirely. In other words, the content should fit the form. Fluid images, therefore, are refitted automatically to every screen resolution and orientation such as the iPad, iPhone, Blackberry, and Android. Media queries function as filters for CSS Technology. CSS solutions change styles to match individual devices and their characteristics such as display type, width, height, orientation and screen resolution. For example, if a page design is either too small or large, a media query can detect the incompatibility and use a CSS script to rearrange the site's content. This is particular helpful when fluid grids start to 'break' and no longer look appealing. This point when websites no longer look good or function as they are built to is called a "breakpoint". Media queries are applied to define these 'breakpoints' which automatically adjusts or fixes the problem.

Your Customers

A study done by Google, called Think Insights on Mobile, found there is a 61 percent chance that users abandon sites difficult to use. As mobile usage explodes and the smartphone penetrates, customers want the same experience from their phones as they get on their computers. Businesses that fail to adapt risk losing out a huge market hold and being outpaced by their competitors.

Responsive web design requires you to respond to the growing demands of consumers and the multitude of mobile devices, with only one website coded to meet them all. It saves bandwidth, decrease loading time, and be accessed from every mobile device. If losing customers, revenue, and reputation are things you want your business to avoid, then contact us today and find out how responsive web design can help you.