Are There Any Drawbacks to Rapid Application Development?
Rapid Application Development, or RAD as it’s usually called, is one way to remove the guesswork out of what an application needs to do. It calls for the people who are creating the software to make smaller versions of their software and get user feedback. The result can be that applications are developed quickly. However, there are many critics who point out the drawbacks to RAD. The main complaint most people have is there is no centralized project manager or development authority. Decisions are made by committee, which means that some decisions don’t end up getting made. The products that get released may not have all the functionality the users ultimately need, leading to disappointment. Since the product is basically a prototype until the very end, there may not be a documented user requirement document or other helpful documentation about the software. However, drawbacks to RAD have been addressed by the “2080 development” method. It achieves its name from the “80/20” rule, which
