What is Software Development and Software Development Life Cycle
02/12/2024 posted by Admin Birendra Kr. Sharma
Software development is the process of designing, creating, testing, and maintaining different software applications. It involves the application of various principles and techniques from computer science, engineering and mathematical analysis. Software development aims to create efficient, reliable, and easy-to-use software.
The process of software development involves several phases as depicted below using a Software Development life Cycle (SDLC):
Stage 1: Planning and Requirement Analysis
Requirement analysis is the most important and fundamental stage in SDLC. It is performed by the senior members of the team with inputs from the customer, the sales department, market surveys and domain experts in the industry. This information is then used to plan the basic project approach and to conduct product feasibility study in the economical, operational and technical areas.
Stage 2: Defining Requirements
Once the requirement analysis is done the next step is to clearly define and document the product requirements and get them approved from the customer or the market analysts. This is done through an SRS (Software Requirement Specification) document which consists of all the product requirements to be designed and developed during the project life cycle.
Stage 3: Designing the Product Architecture
SRS is a reference for software designers to come up with the best architecture for the software. Hence, with the requirements defined in SRS, multiple designs for the product architecture are present in the Design Document Specification (DDS).
This DDS is assessed by market analysts and stakeholders. After evaluating all the possible factors, the most practical and logical design is chosen for development.
Stage 4: Building or Developing the Product
In this stage of SDLC the actual development starts and the product is built. The programming code is generated as per DDS during this stage. If the design is performed in a detailed and organized manner, code generation can be accomplished without much hassle.
Stage 5: Testing the Product
This stage is usually a subset of all the stages as in the modern SDLC models, the testing activities are mostly involved in all the stages of SDLC. However, this stage refers to the testing only stage of the product where product defects are reported, tracked, fixed and retested, until the product reaches the quality standards defined in the SRS.
Stage 6: Deployment in the Market and Maintenance
Once the product is tested and ready to be deployed it is released formally in the appropriate market. Sometimes product deployment happens in stages as per the business strategy of that organization. The product may first be released in a limited segment and tested in the real business environment (UAT- User acceptance testing).
Then based on the feedback, the product may be released as it is or with suggested enhancements in the targeting market segment. After the product is released in the market, its maintenance is done for the existing customer base.
The goal of the SDLC model is to deliver high-quality, maintainable software that meets the user’s requirements. SDLC in software engineering models outlines the plan for each stage so that each stage of the software development model can perform its task efficiently to deliver the software at a low cost within a given time frame that meets users’ requirements.
SDLC Models
There are various software development life cycle models defined and designed which are followed during the software development process. These models are also referred as Software Development Process Models". Each process model follows a Series of steps unique to its type to ensure success in the process of software development we will be discussing various models in our Blog dedicated to SDLC Models.
Following are the most important and popular SDLC models followed in the industry -
Waterfall Model
Iterative Model
Spiral Model
V-Model
Big Bang Model