Software development is a very complex process, and at the output customers (and developers as well) expect to get a fully workable project that operates smoothly and demand no further fixes. To ensure that a solution will be of high quality, it has to deal with a long and very complicated process, namely, 7 main phases of any software development project. Let’s take a closer look at all these stages.
#1 Business analysis
The first and the most important stage of the whole software development process is business analysis which shapes the project, helps to establish effective communication between the parties involved. During this phase, business analysts gather all the information needed for the project, and defines the requirements.
#2 System requirements specification
Before software development starts, the project stakeholders should document all the system’s features and behavior. A system requirements specification includes such elements as business model, technical and functional requirements, system qualities, acceptance criteria, and more.
#3 UI Design Services
The concept of the future solution is developed on this very stage. The product is designed according to the specifications made during the previous phases. Designers take into account all the requirements and deliver the final prototype according to which the project will be created.
#4 Software development
When all the requirements are detailed and the resources identified, then developers may get down to work. Software developers receive all the technical information, divide the work into units and start coding. This is the most time-consuming phase of the project’s lifecycle.
#5 Testing and QA
QA specialists check the code quality using various frameworks and testing types which help them to find all the bugs in the system. Basing based on these data, QA engineers write test cases to report bugs to the development team. After all the issues are concerned, the solution is ready to be deployed.
#6 Release
Once all the previous phases are completed, the project is moving towards its final stage – release. Every piece of code is written, all bugs are fixed, and the solution is ready to be introduced to its final users. The first release may be followed by releases of other product versions.
#7 Maintenance and Support
After the project is released, communication between customers and the development team is often not ended. Сustomers turn for further maintenance and technical support according to which the solution gets updates and has all the issues fixed.
Conclusion
Each of the stages has its own specific features and contributes to the successful realization of the following ones. The featured software development phases are followed by the majority of IT companies. Such companies offer complete transparency of any step and allow taking everything under control no matter which business model is used.
Author bio: Mary Smith is a marketing specialist and tech journalist at EffectiveSoft – a custom software company. Software development services by EffectiveSoft include IT consulting, software prototyping, solutions development, quality assurance, and more.
