Mobile Software: Does Changeable Mean Cost-Effective?

Every client of a software company naturally wants to get the most out of what they are paying for. One of the in-demand 'qualities' attributed to good software is flexibility, or changeability. Everyone understands it in their own way, but the general approach is that changeable software can be easier adapted to the changing environments in business and technology. If the market and users require a change, it can be easier implemented without excessive efforts. But does it all correlate with the client's wish to make the product cost-effective? Not directly.

Early planning does help increase the ROI of the project. A quick start is good, but it doesn't help the software owner to look to the future. But in order to do that, the software owner has to understand the goals of the product and the personal goals, and initially start relationships with a professional development team, which has project management, design, development, and quality assurance merged in one work process.

The Agile And The Changeable

Many software companies work according to agile principles. They claim iterational development to be a good way to quickly respond to changes in the requirements set by the client. Although it is, it doesn't guarantee changeable software as the outcome, so don't confuse these two notions.

Agile approach to carrying out projects allow to alter your product in case of need with lesser efforts and within shorter time. But the changeability of software is the foundation that can be laid from the very beginning. It's no one else but developers who create the changeability; the agile approach may help them use this changeability in the future.

The Balance You Need

Software flexibility by itself is not cost-effective. Neither it can be called good nor bad by itself. It's good when it's needed, when you need to adapt your software. There are basically three options:

• Make flexible where you'll need it (win).
• Make flexible where you won't need it (lose). The further danger is that 'overflexible' software is harder to support in the following years. When there is be need for more adjustments, there'll be no guarantee that you'll get the same team who built it to do the job. Meanwhile the developers who don't know it will require more time to figure things out.
• Not make flexible where you'll need it (lose). It could require deep refactoring in the future - it's not something to be called cost-effective.

Predict Success Or Adapt To Changes?

If you cannot predict success, you must be able to quickly adapt to changes - up to radically changing the philosophy of your software product (which is quite common with startups, too). One of the best sources of help here is your software team - the project manager and developers. Their mix of experience and enthusiasm can help you understand where and how the changeability should be applied with more chances of success - especially if they created roughly similar products in the past.

The evolving technology and mobile market won't allow a mobile startup to plan things and launch the product in a year. Even less time is enough to make the product irrelevant. It was earlier that computers were meant for limited use, there were fewer hardware options, and desktop versions of Windows could last for years and years.

Now the power of a computer can be held in a hand, and major updates of mobile platforms are released at least once a year, while minor ones are about four times more frequent. Our devices became more sensitive to environment - they have cameras, accelerometers, GPS, connectivity, augmented reality, and more. Whoever isn't able to adapt, loses.


Who can allow themselves to roll out the mobile product in a year as planned? Definitely not startups. This can be allowed by only large, stable businesses, which occupy hardly varying segments of the market. For example, software for inventory management. Well, it does change, but to a definitely lesser extent than such software categories as games and entertainment. Another example is an app that represents a map of public transport. Adding a new subway line or station is not likely to cause problems.

As opposed, there are social networks. The behavior of users can be roughly categorized, but generally it's quite unpredictable to know what is going to hit the mark. Just remember the ideas of Twitter (many people at the time doubted that limiting blog posts to 140 characters would attract people) and Instagram (the earliest versions were very, very poor).


Utilize the experience of your developers to reach the first option. A classic mobile startup is in search of the market and quickly reacts to user feedback. As for the work of developers, creating and maintaining software is still an art for many reasons - and finding the balance between changeable and cost-effective is one of them.


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