Good project documentation addresses a number of issues. For those clients who choose to maintain a web solution using their own staff or hosting company, having a record of a site’s features, styles, scripts, etc. can help ensure consistency as well as proper maintenance and function. Those that hire Sapient Design for only research or design (but not development), will find that detailed specifications are indispensable to the engineers and programmers who will bring the project to completion.

Sample Deliverables:

User Interface Specifications
A comprehensive document that provides all details pertaining to the design of the product. A good specification will provide all information that a developer would need to create the finished product.

Training and How-To Guides
Targeted to your specific audience, simple instructions are created for your unique solution including graphics and screenshots.

Style Guides
A comprehensive guide that helps ensure site continuity both visually and in terms of voice. May include such topics as standards for sizing/optimizing graphics, where to use certain heading and special text styles, text alignment, how links should be structured, proper paragraph and line spacing for body copy, appropriate verb tense for headlines and content, etc.

Structural or Site Map
A flow chart that outlines the navigational structure of the application or website.

Decision Tables
Every possible interaction is documented and appropriate error handling is determined.

Site Vocabulary and Taxonomy
Used mainly for data intensive sites, site vocabulary and taxonomy defines how information is labeled, classified and organized and how it is searched for, browsed, and displayed. This may include creation of vocabulary lists that include variant terms (ie. “ui” as a term for “user interface”, related terms, and preferred terms as well as definitions of the algorithms used for retrieving data.