Prototype, MVP and SRS

Do you know what it is? It's an MVP and SRS which is 200 years old. Pay attention to the background of this picture, you will find quite a lot of them.

2 centures ago masters of the sculpture used to create plaster models according to requirements of their customers first, then when the plaster models were approved, the work on the actual sculpture either in marble or in bronze commenced. Judging from the number of such models I have recently seen in a museum in Florence, it was a standard approach in the industry.

So, two centures ago "hardware" masters of that time realized the importance of prototype creation in order to formalize requirement specifications. I would even go as far as stating that in many cases such prototypes could serve as minimal viable products, or in other words, they were so good that the customers actually placed them in their palaces and houses as-is.

I have written this short post to refer to it in the future and explain to my customers the need for proper documentation of software requirements and necessity of development of MVP first.

By the way, check my advices for coding when you are in a startup.