Trying to ditch the functional specification...

There’s a great article courtesy of Basecamp’s 37signals called ‘Getting Real, Step 1: No Functional Spec’.

It’s not a new article, February 2005 to be exact, but it’s a almost a great read for anybody wondering if functional specification are still the best approach to define a web site. The reason I say ‘almost a great read’ is that although it’s a great summary of everything wrong with the functional specification, it doesn’t really present a viable alternate.

The reason why I raise this 6 year old article now is that I’m personally getting tired of writing functional specification. I’m also getting tired of people not wanting to read functional specifications, review functional specifications and use functional specifications. I don’t blame others, I don’t want to read them either. They are clunky, long, and difficult to use.

All in all, there must be a better way...

I’m putting myself on the path to find this better way and it’s going to be an adventure. Over the next couple of months, I’ll be looking into a range of user interface delivery methods that satisfy the client, our designers and our developers.

Stay tuned...