Introduction
The minimal technical design document (MDD) presents a small and simple technical design document. In big companies where many people are involved a technical design document is very important. The later some pitfalls arise the more it costs. However in a startup we have not as many people involved and time is rare. So why not reducing the size of the MDD and make it more presentable?
Purpose of an MDD
The MDD has two global requirements:
- The developer/architect has to think the feature through
- It was written in a presentable manner for other stakeholder (co-founder, manager, etc.)
The main questions which should be answered:
- Why should exactelly this effort be done?
- What should be done?
- How the what should be done?
A template for an MDD
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The WHY
- Project justification
- Goals and objectives
The WHAT
- Project description
- High level architecture
- Ressources and interfaces
- etc.
The HOW
- Architecture Breakdown
- Implementation details (Key algorithms, processes, etc.)
- etc.
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The WHEN can be decided as soon as the MDD is finished. Based on the MDD it is possible to create a better estimate on how long it takes.
Conclusion
This is a very simple and tiny MDD and helped us to create a coherent knowledge base in our startup.
Enjoy! ❤️