Iterative development slices the deliverable business value (system functionality) into iterations. In each iteration a slice of functionality is delivered through cross-discipline work, starting from the model/requirements through to the testing/deployment. The unified process groups iterations into phases: inception, elaboration, construction, and transition. - Inception identifies project scope, risks, and requirements (functional and non-functional) at a high level but in enough detail that work can be estimated.
- Elaboration delivers a working architecture that mitigates the top risks and fulfills the non-functional requirements.
- Construction incrementally fills-in the architecture with production-ready code produced from analysis, design, implementation, and testing of the functional requirements.
- Transition delivers the system into the production operating environment.
Each of the phases may be divided into 1 or more iterations, which are usually time-boxed rather than feature-boxed. Architects and analysts work one iteration ahead of developers and testers to keep their work-product backlog full. |