The Software Development Life Cycles (SDLC) is a method for designing, developing, and testing high-quality software in the software industry. The SDLC is designed to deliver high-quality software that meets or exceeds customer expectations and is completed on time and on budget.
The abbreviation SDLC stands for Software Development Life Cycle.
Software Development Process is another name for it.
The Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is a framework that defines the activities that must be completed at each stage of the software development process.
The international standard ISO/IEC 12207 governs software life-cycle procedures. It aspires to be the industry standard for defining all software development and maintenance responsibilities.
What is the SDLC process?
Within a software organisation, the SDLC (software development life cycle in agile) is a process that is followed for a software project. It is a detailed strategy that explains how to build, maintain, replace, and change or improve certain software. The life cycle is a mechanism for enhancing software quality and the development process as a whole.
Steps for software development life cycle
- Step 1: Gathering and analysing requirements
- Step 2: Feasibility investigation or Planning
- Step 3: Design
- Step 4: coding
- Step 5: Testing
- Step 6:Installation/Deployment
- Step 7:Maintenance .
Detail steps for software development life cycles
STEP 1 : Gathering and analysing requirements
The first stage of the SDLC (software development life cycle in agile) process is the requirement. It is led by senior team members, with input from all stakeholders and industry domain specialists. At this step, the quality assurance needs are planned for, and the risks associated are identified.
This stage provides a clearer view of the overall project’s scope as well as the anticipated difficulties, opportunities, and directions that prompted the project.
Requirements Teams must gather specific and exact criteria throughout the gathering step. This enables businesses to finalise the timescale required to complete the system’s work.
STEP 2: Feasibility investigation or Planning
All of the requirements for the target software are stated at this stage. Customers, market experts, and stakeholders all approve of these needs.
STEP 3: Design
The system and software design documents are prepared in this third phase according to the requirement specification document. This aids in the definition of the overall system architecture.
This design step is used as input for the model’s following phase.
STEP 4: Coding
After the system design phase, the coding step begins. Developers begin building the entire system in this phase by developing code in the programming language of choice. Tasks are separated into sections or modules and given to different developers during the coding phase. It is the most time-consuming step of the Software Development Life Cycle.
During this phase, the developer must adhere to a set of predetermined code principles. They must also produce and implement code using programming tools such as compilers, interpreters, and debuggers.
STEP 5: Testing
After the product has been developed, it is vital to test the programme to guarantee that it runs smoothly. Although, at each stage of the SDLC, minimal testing is carried out.
As a result, at this point, all potential problems are identified, corrected, and retested. This guarantees that the product meets the SRS quality standards.
As testing operations are mainly included in all phases of SDLC in current SDLC models, this stage is frequently a subset of all stages. However, this stage simply relates to the product’s testing step, during which flaws are reported, monitored, repaired, and retested until the product meets the SRS’s quality criteria.
STEP 6 : Deployement
Depending on the customer’s expectations, the product is either put in the production environment or initially subjected to UAT (User Acceptance Testing).
In UAT, a replica of the production environment is constructed, and the customer, in collaboration with the developers, does the testing. If the client is satisfied with the application, the customer must sign off for it to go live.
STEP 7: Maintenance
Following the deployment of the system and the commencement of client use of the designed system, the three actions listed below take place.
Bug fixing – problems are reported as a result of some circumstances that have not been tested at all.
Upgrade – The process of updating a programme to a newer version of the software.
Enhancement – Introducing new functionality into current software.
The primary goal of this SDLC phase is to guarantee that needs are addressed and that the system continues to work as specified in the first phase.
What is the life cycle of software development?
The Software Development Life Cycle, or SDLC, is a method for producing high-quality, low-cost software in the least amount of time. SDLC is a well-structured flow of stages that enables a company to swiftly develop high-quality software that has been thoroughly tested and is ready for production.
As stated in the introduction, the SDLC(software development life cycles) is divided into six phases. The waterfall model, spiral model, and Agile model are all popular SDLC models.
So, what is the Software Development Life Cycle and how does it work?
The six phases of the software development life cycle in agile
1. Concept
2. Inception
3. Iteration
4. Release
5. Maintenance
6. Retirement
software development life cycle advantages and disadvantages
Advantages of software development life cycles
- At the end of each step, a formal review is established to provide maximum management oversight.
- This method generates a large amount of system documentation.
- This documentation guarantees that system needs may be linked to specified business requirements.
- It generates a large number of intermediate products that may be inspected to see whether they fulfil the demands of the user and comply to standards. These may be improved if necessary, ensuring that the firm receives exactly what it requires.
Disadvantages of software development life cycles
- What may appear to be a huge issue to others, the end-user does not perceive the remedy until the system is nearly complete.
- Users receive a system that satisfies the creators’ understanding of the requirement; this may not be what was truly required of them. There might be a translation error.
- Documentation is costly and time-consuming to produce. It’s also challenging to stay up to date. What is current this month may not be the same next year!
- Users are unable to readily assess intermediate products and determine if a certain product (e.g., data flow diagram) satisfies their business needs.
