Understanding the Software Development Life Cycle
The SDLC describes the steps in a model for software development throughout its life. As shown in Figure 12.1, it maps software creation from an idea to requirements gathering and analysis to design, coding, testing, and rollout. Once software it in production, it also includes user training, maintenance, and decommissioning at the end of the software package’s useful life.
Software development does not always follow a formal model, but most enterprise development for major applications does follow most, if not all, of these phases. In some cases, developers may even use elements of an SLDC model without realizing it!
The SDLC is useful for organizations and for developers because it provides a consistent framework to structure workflow and to provide planning for the development process. Despite these advantages, simply picking an SDLC model to implement may not always be the best choice. Each...