Software Development Life Cycle is the process of developing software that serves as a standard in the IT industry for designing, development and testing of high-end software according to customized demands and expectations of a client. SDLC aims to achieve the final result while keeping a control on deadlines as well as the costs associated with development. SDLC is a step by step mechanism that serves as the broad plan for software development and is used by high-end software development firms for developing particular software or enhancing the value proposition of the same. Software development life cycle follows the following crucial stages for developing software:
- Stage-I: Requirement Analysis & Planning First and the most important stage of SDLC requires careful planning by senior members of software development team who after taking inputs from the client, sales division, market surveys and niche experts come out with a detailed plan for conducting different feasibility checks for analyzing the product viability. Planning requires careful analysis of various technical, operational and economical factors that can impact the success of a development project.
- Stage-II: Defining Specific Product Requirements Once basic framework is laid down, the next step involves clearly laying out and documenting the product requirements. After clear documentation, client approval is sought or a product is approved by market analysts using a SRS document consisting of various product requirements for design and development.
- Stage-III: Product Architecture Designing After SRS is documented, it serves as a basic reference document for product architects using which product architecture is developed. The product architects propose multiple design approaches and document the same in Design Document Specification (DDS). The DDS then is reviewed and assessed by various stakeholders on different parameters and one design approach is selected in the end. The design approach defines various architectural modules along with various representations along with third-party modules.
- Stage-IV: Product Development After all the documentation, actual product development starts during this stage. A programmer uses DDS to generate a programming code that fulfills the different requirements from a product. Program developers follow stringent coding guidelines to write down code that are defined by an organization. Also, programmers use different programming tools for generating codes using one of the various high level programming language according to product requirements.
- Stage-V: Product Testing The testing stage involves testing the products for perfection according to pre-defined quality standards. Various product defects are tracked, reported and are fixed during this stage and the final product is retested for perfection according to standards defined in the SRS.
- Stage-VI: Product Deployment & Maintenance After product development and testing, the final product is deployed for usage in the markets. A product is deployed according to the business strategy of an organization- either in limited segment or in real business environment.