What is Software Development Life Cycle and How Does it Work?

Software Development Life Cycle is a methodology or process that defines the stages associated in which describes how to develop, maintain, replace and alter or innovate particular software. In other words, the life cycle consists of a methodology for upgrading the quality of software and the entire development process. SDLC is the acronym used for Software Development Life Cycle.

Following are the different stages of a typical Software Development Life Cycle:

• Planning
• Defining
• Designing
• Building
• Testing
• Deployment

Here is a detailed explanation of all the stages involved in the Software Development Life Cycle:

Planning and Requirement Analysis

Requirement analysis is the major and fundamental stage in SDLC. A member which is in the senior post performs this task by taking required inputs from the client, the sales department, and through various market surveys and renowned domain experts in the industry. Then the information collected is used to plan the primary project approach and study the product feasibility in the different areas such as economic, technical, and operational. Quality assurance and identifying risk-related planning are also done in this stage.

Defining Requirements

After the planning and requirement analysis stage, here comes the next step which is to explicitly determine and document various product requirements and take approval on them from the market analyst or client. This is done through the Software Requirement Specification document which contains all the product requirements to be developed and designed during the entire project cycle.

Designing the Product Architecture

Software Requirement Specification (SRS) is the denotation for product architects to showcase their best abilities with great architecture for the product to be designed. On the basis of requirements mentioned in SRS, generally, more than one design is proposed for the said product and gets documented in Design Document Specification (DDS). All the major stakeholder’s review DDS under various factors, such as product design, budget, modularity, risk assessment, product robustness, and time constraints, and the best approach for the design gets selected.

Building and Developing the Product

In this stage, the real development of the product begins and the product is built. Based on DDS, the programming code is created throughout this stage. Code generation will be much easier if the design is performed in an easy-to-understand, organized and detailed manner. There is one thing that the developers should keep in mind which is following the guidelines. They should adhere to the guidelines determined by their firm.

Testing the Product

This stage is generally the subset of the other stages as in the advanced Software Development Life Cycle models, the testing is mostly involved in all the stages. Despite that, this stage solely refers to the testing stage of the product because in this stage product defects are determined by the developer’s track, fix and retest them until the product gets to the quality standards stated in SRS.

Deployment in the Market and Maintenance 

This stage comes when the product is thoroughly tested and ready to be deployed. It is launched in the appropriate market officially. There are times when product deployment also occurs in stages as per the strategy defined by the company. It involves the product getting launched in a limited segment and then getting tested in the real business environment which is also known as UAT (User Acceptance Testing). Then considering the feedback and reviews it is enhanced or gets launched in the market.  

Software Development Life Cycle Models

SDLC models are the various models that are followed throughout the software development process. Each model follows a series of steps to bring out the successful product at the end of the software development process.

Here are some important and renowned models opted in the industry:

Waterfall Model

This model is the primeval and explicit SDLC model. We complete one phase and then move on to the other using this methodology. Each phase consists of its mini-plan and its “waterfalls” into the next phase. The main disadvantage of this model is that small details ignored can hold back the entire process.

Iterative Model

As the name suggests, this model emphasizes repetition. In this model, Developers develop a variant very fast and with less expensive comparatively. They can test and improvise it then by rapid and successive versions. The main drawback is that it can exhaust the resources very fast if left unchecked.

V-Shaped Model

This SDLC model is the extension of the waterfall model. In this methodology testing is done at every stage and it has the same cons as in the waterfall model.

Big Bang Model

This is a high-risk SDLC model as it throws a major part of its resources at the development and only works better when used in small projects. As for the large products, it lacks the proper requirements definition stage of the other methods. 

Spiral Model 

This SDLC model is the most flexible of all the models. It is somewhat similar to the iterative model as it also practices repetition. The spiral model goes through many phases such as planning, design, building, and testing many times with improvements each time.

Conclusion

The software development process provides the company with the highest level of management control and documentation. This makes the developers thoroughly understand what and why they are building the product assigned to them. Here at Xornor Technologies, we provide Live classroom development to create a pixel-perfect design and hands-on experience in several technologies. Here you get desired product made with proper planning and strategy.

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