Mistakes to Avoid in Custom Web Application Development

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Custom Web App Development. Since Tim Berners-Lee founded the world wide web in 1989, web application development has completely changed from a static HTML page to a dynamic and complex one.

But developing a custom web app with no issues isn’t possible unless you are a God of Programming.

Whether you are developing a web application project from scratch or have a stable one, a simple mistake can lead to dire consequences for the application system. And by acknowledging the common errors other developers often commit, you can reduce the risk of exposing your project to unfavorable events.

So, in this blog, we will discuss the top mistakes you must avoid while developing custom web applications.

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Custom Web App Development

One of the most crucial questions that run in the mind of developers is how their app is unsuccessful even after following all the necessary steps.

If you are in this situation and confused, the chances are you haven’t paid attention to a few significant factors that can make or break the project's success.

Read: Custom Web App Architecture

That’s why we have listed the mistakes that developers are most likely to make and the ways to avoid these common errors during the development and increase the chances of success.

Neglecting Research and Due Diligence

Most business owners want to start developing a custom web app immediately after hiring a development team without taking proper steps into account. Although the enthusiasm is worth admiration, you need to slow down and research to analyze how to proceed with the project.

Spending time to find the best custom app development architecture, methodologies, design patterns, tools, and technologies will save you the time of frustration down the road.

Moreover, besides researching the tools and techniques for the project development, you need to analyze the custom app development company to hire by following some tips we had shared in our previous blog.

Not Understanding Target Users

As developing and marketing any web app in the market relies on user research, you should not make assumptions about users’ perspectives and needs. Not understanding your target audience can lead your project for the rocks.

Read: Custom Web Application Design Patterns

However, executing user research isn’t enough, so you must make the findings more accurate. The user research must give insights into demographics, personas, behavioral patterns, and motivations. Another thing to consider here is understanding competitors offering to set clear goals for building unique solutions.

Some of the questions you need to ask yourself before moving to web app development are:

• Will the web app adapt to the market trends in the upcoming years?

• Does your project provide a valuable solution to the user?

• Will the features and functionality overwhelm the user?

In short, researching the audience and validating your ideas before initiating app development can give a head start on your project.

Mismanaging Budget

Budget plays a significant role in custom app development. Regardless of the industry, nature, and scale, custom web app development is an essential investment for your business. So, you need to stay under budget and handle it appropriately.

To help you in avoiding an overflowing budget, we have listed three important points:

• Make a detailed budget for the development

• Assign funds to comprise additional costs

• Strictly adhere to the set budget guidelines.

Poor Communication with Developers

Communication with developers is an integral part of the custom app development process. Without proper communication, developers won’t get the idea you have for the web app making the task more complicated to commit than it should be.

The best way to communicate with a developer is to spare no details and make no assumptions which you can achieve by offering detailed documentation with every necessary element consisting of a synopsis of the web app, its wireframe, and a list of features.

Once you have provided the documentation, the development team will share the quote with any other suggestions they might have.

Incorrect Input Validation

Input validations ensure that users provide information in the proper data format to enter into the database system. As it can be tricky to identify a cyber attack, implementing input validations prevents any malformed data from residing in the database.

Read: Graph Database

Input validation should happen as soon as the system receives data from external sources. Incorrect input validation can lead to an insecure system with memory leakage or injection attacks.

Developers can apply input validation on both semantic (correctness of value) and syntactical (syntax correctness) levels. They can use data type validators, type conversion with exceptional handling, apply input validation against XML and JSON schema, and check min and max value range for strings.

Not Creating an MVP

A minimum viable product or MVP is a basic version of the web app consisting of its fundamental features and components. MVPs help developers to understand their potential to succeed by launching it in the market to the target audience.

Read: Cost To Build A Hotel Booking Application

Not creating an MVP can increase the time and resources to develop the web app while increasing the chance of failure.

Read: On-demand Medicine Delivery App Development

On the other hand, creating and testing an MVP can save time and resources on the project and check if the product is according to the trends and appealing to the users. It also helps in acquiring early adopters and investors.

Poor UI/UX

More often than not, both clients and developers get immersed in developing the backend logic for the application that the user interface and experience become their last concerns. However, that should never happen because the main reason for poor traction on the web app is - a bad user interface.

Users have certain expectations from a web app's ease of usage. So, a few features that the web app should have are a search tab, simple navigation, images, videos, call-to-action buttons, dropdown menus, and a home button that takes users to the main page.

Libraries Overuse

Although third-party libraries can save time and provide pre-tested, modular code, they also increase dependencies, security issues, and lack of support.

Overusing libraries often creates dependency conflicts and makes it tough to identify errors. It also expands the size of the web app while increasing the development time. Therefore, you must choose the library packages wisely with the help of the development team.

RESTful Anti Patterns

RESTful APIs have a powerful impact on web app development and are not going anywhere. Most web apps have REST services implemented. However, sometimes these RESTful patterns and services fail when not created according to the de facto standards.

Read: Principles of Web API Design

Some of the most common mistakes that happen while creating REST APIs are:

• APIs are collections of different methods like GET, PUSH, PUT, DELETE, and POST. And tunneling everything through the GET method leads to unidentified resources, unmatched HTTP semantics, and unintentional side effects from crawlers.

• Using HTTP response codes, developers can identify the nature of the bug in the API request. Most of us know that a 404 error represents a page not found, while a 500 error refers to an internal service error. These are just two of the many more HTTP responses. Using these HTTP status codes accurately can help servers and clients communicate easily.

• If you don’t use the rich semantics of the HTTP status codes, you will miss the opportunity for loose coupling, better interoperability, and reusability.

• Other RESTful APIs anti-patterns to avoid are ignoring caching, misusing cookies, forgetting hypermedia, tunneling everything through posts, and breaking self-description.

Skipping Test Cases

Sipping product testing can eventually lead to negative impacts on the performance of the web application. Sometimes developers miss adding test cases or use testing tools that can fail the web application. Not using test practices while developing any software application is a rookie mistake often made by newbie developers.

Read: Code analysis tools for Java

It’s necessary to include static and dynamic testing practices while writing source code. It helps identify any errors or problems that might arise while developing the project. Including testing in the web app development process also ensures that it works as expected without bringing the entire system down due to performance failure.

Conclusion

So those were the list of common mistakes that might occur at the time of custom application development. We hope it will help you avoid these mistakes while working on your project.

If you are a business developer who wants to hire experienced developers to build a remarkable web application, all you need to do is get in touch with our experts. They will help you find the right technologies and tools to make the development process smooth and efficient.