The Incremental Commitment Spiral Model: Principles and Practices for Successful Systems and Software

6. Exploration Phase

“Making the familiar strange and the strange familiar.”

—First attributed to the German poet Novalis (1772–1801)

The genesis of a new need or system typically starts with an identified problem or a desire to perform an activity “better.” “Better” can be defined in many ways—automation of manual tasks, faster, cheaper, safer, more securely, and more accurately, to name but a few possibilities. Solutions for this need (or capability) can range from relatively simple to extremely complex, with each solution providing a potentially different level of acceptability, cost, and time to realization. The goal of this phase is to spend time exploring alternative solutions to identify candidate(s) that will potentially provide a sufficient ...