Concurrent systems development model (CSDM) for client-driven electronic commerce system development

The waterfall and incremental models are widely used for guiding E-commerce system development. In some cases where clients demand a quick solution to maximise their business benefit, these models are not fully fit in directing such projects. This is because the client’s prioritisation of system requirements is determined by immediate business benefit whereas the developer’s is based on the long-term system usability and reliability. The concurrent system development model (CSDM) proposed in this paper is an alternative approach for guiding system development, especially for client-driven business systems. Its waterfall-based framework is easy to follow and understand by the developers. Its component-based stream only iterates over the Implementation, Testing, and Deployment stages. Since the design for the overall system and prototypes is done at the same stage, all the prototypes can be fully or partly absorbed into the corresponding system groups, and/or modified to fit into the system design. The local iterations realise the business needs separately using prototyping without interference with the progression of the overall system development, which ensures the quick deployment of a prototype. The case of WCE Pizza online system proves that CSDM is an effective approach to guide the development of client-driven E-commerce systems.