App Accomplished: Strategies for App Development Success

2. The App Development Life Cycle

Every app goes through a series of steps or phases between idea and completion. This chapter discusses a simple but iterative model that has three major phases: design, development, and testing (see Figure 2.1). Some people divide these phases further. For example, some people might make a distinction between internal testing and external testing or separate graphical design and user interface design, but for purposes of this book, those distinctions are not particularly helpful.

Figure 2.1 An example of an app life cycle flowchart.

Some apps spend more time in a given phase than others, and some apps skimp on ...