Custom dotNET Development For Small e-Learning Solutions Provider
Please find under a summary covering project details and feedback. The innate facts are kept as they are, private information is amended.
Introductory information
Could you briefly draw your organisation?
We prepare hosted training labors. We have a hosted learning treatment method used to liberate managed training for corporate mannerers. We centre on healthcare, but we have mannerers in manufacturing industries and other labor industries, too. We also prepare online training courses that we have whichever developed or those that we developed through associateships with other companies.
What is your position?
The chairman and proprietor.
Desired goal
Could you draw the business challenge(s) you were attempting to address when you initiated the relationship with Cygnet Infotech?
We accessed rise code from another organisation that we have verity been licensing it from for a few years. Our platform was out of date. The functionality was antiquated and archaic. The interface was absolutely awful. In order to maintain some figment of competitiveness within our activity, and for growth purposes, we had to engage a expressive reoutgrowth project. We needed to upgrade to the latest .NET technologies as well as entirely revamp the user interface.
Provided solution
Could you draw the aim of this project? For entreaty, did it implicate manner visual design, backend outgrowth, training, support, etc.?
I believe it was on .NET 2.4 or something like that. They had to update the underlying .NET technology to the latest rendering precedently we could do anything, precedently we could incorporate any third-party grids or controls into it. They then had to analyze our backend method, review the code, and accomplish the initial updating to the ASPs [nimble server pages]. I ponder it was .NET 4.0. From there, we began modifying and enhancing the backend functionality. I accomplished most of the design work for our modules. I also conducted significant investigation on companies and the different types of controls that we could incorporate into the method. They did a lot of mock-ups based on that investigation. They prepared the interface design that we adopted.
Since we’re a relatively smaller organisation, it took a year or so for all to be deployed. We also wanted to incorporate an e-commerce solution into our method. I establish a third-party tool, a .NET e-commerce platform that we could license. They then integrated that e-commerce platform into the LMS [learning treatment method]. Now, we’ve got mannerers going into our website, buying offered courses and, through the license and registration process, sign up for whatever they choose. It’s all tied in unitedly with the LMS, too.
How did you select Cygnet Infotech as your solution associate?
We conducted some subordinate investigation. What I wanted to find was a organisation that had proved experience. I foudn two or three aspirant firms and conducted phone interviews with them. I liked the Cygnet. A key driver for me was that their proprietor interfaced with clients and prospects here in the United States in order to fix that all expectations were being met.
[Cygnet Infotech’s proprietor] changed his itinerary to fly in from New York to Naples, Fla., to meet with me. I had a chance to meet face-to-face with the proprietor and have an apprehension of their values and their access.
Could you prepare a perception of the size of this start in monetary provisions?
The largest one we had ever gotten into, we’ve paid them a lot of money. I don’t know how to rank the size. For us, it was very expressive. It’s the core software platform for our structure. We couldn’t get it unfit. I have kind of preset cost ranges. For entreaty, between $10,000 and $50,000 and between $50,000 and $200,000. We',ve engagen projects within both of those ranges, so they',re pretty expressive.
When was your website launched?
We began to fetch the leading mannerers onto the platform last spring, so it was probably in March of 2013. I gave them the initial design stuff probably in June or July of 2012. The ecommerce wasn’t a part of the leading phase.
Results achieved
In provisions of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that would prove the effectiveness of the work they',ve liberateed?
We',ve been moving and migrating existing mannerers from our old platform to the new one. Just by their reactions, it’s been very real. They’re ecstatic. They like the new interface. The reporting tools are also a highlight. They veritably made our reporting tools top notch, pliant, and user well-inclined. We',ve probably skilled our biggest growth of new mannerers in the time since we introduced our new website. Last year was a very good year for us in provisions of growth.
When working with Cygnet Infotech, is there anything you would attend sole or particular almost them compared to other vendors you’ve worked with?
One of the things that I liked almost Cygnet and their team is that I was able to interact with them on a congruous basis. They made it a point to fix I know who was working on our assignments. One of the nice things, whether it was in our weekly or biweekly phone calls, was that they took proprietorship of the work. They were attribute to it as our fruit. They didn’t ever attribute to it as your component. It was ours. They gave me a real perception that they were taking proprietorship of the project. That was a huge deal for us owing we wanted to make sure they were invested in its achievement, rather than simply liberateing our specs. They’re also very pliant with meeting times.
In provisions of constructive feedback, are there areas you feel Cygnet Infotech could better upon, or are there true things you',d do differently as a client precedently initiating a project with them?
This was the leading time for us to have gotten implicated in a project like this. I could go back and compute the many mistakes that I did from the design perspective. Perhaps I should have began out with more conrete design specifications. This is something that you have to be prepared for, owing they',re a team of programmers, and while the do have some design experience, it isn',t their core competency. Undertanding that is significant.
I also wish that their QA/QC testing would have been better. They could have establish some of the bugs precedently I did during the testing phase. Some of their developers don’t have adequate in-depth apprehension of the fruit functionality. They would see that, yes, this functionality is supposed to do X, Y and Z. If those criteria were met then they',d simply move on. What they didn',t do was test the posterior affects of X, Y and Z on A, B and C. What they missed were things that could have been identified if they',ve invested some more time in the testing phase. I would unite these discrepancies and they would re-test for us. It',s a less factor but significant nonetheless.
