Have you ever started a project, be it personal or professional, software or not, but it lost steam even before the first version? Or, if the project got to the finish line, you already hated it for taking too long and being much more demanding than expected? Asking for a friend. In all seriousness, been there, tried that, more times than I care to admit. And I have seen it happen to other people as well....
When answering the question of why I should do a millionth shopping list app I gathered the main requirements it must satisfy to cover my use case: multi-platform – I should be able to use it on any device, including mobile and desktop interactive – users can edit items and lists, change their status, hide done items, keep track of several contexts, etc. fast – the app should load fast to decrease cognitive resistance and load...
Recently I have outlined my framework for determining the ‘why’ of a project: what problem it solves and what are its main requirements and target, its return on investment, and, finally, if it is at all viable. Today we will look at how it works on a small pet project of mine listOK – a shopping/to-do list Telegram bot (project page).1. What problem does the project solve? Keeping track of items they need to buy/do in different contexts/places....
Before starting any project, even a small personal one, it’s important to start with its ‘why?’. There are several reasons for that. First, generally speaking, for every project you need to answer three questions: why, what, and how. It is always better to start with ‘why’ because while answering it you will better define its requirements, scope, features, etc. (‘what’ of a project) and without that, it will be difficult to work on ‘how’....