Modern-day tech is changing humankind’s lifestyle incessantly, and spending time on different software solutions has become an everyday routine of people in the 21st century. It is impossible to imagine any everyday activity, especially at the workplace, without any computer-related process.
If we look in-depth, software product development is the major process in the arena that is defined as a precise procedure, inclusive of different strict steps known as the Software Development Life Cycle. If you need a sophisticated application system (either web or mobile app), you look forward to this process.
Surely, you would have several questions and confusions pertaining to SDLC and its processes. Thus, we will take a comprehensive look at the software product development process in this article.
Decoding Software Product Development Process
Software product development process is a term defined as collective steps needed to develop a software product from its initial stage to market presence. Typically, it consists of a number of phases in the complex process of delivering a new product and transforming an old product notion into a marketable solution.
SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) is all about the rules and practices that assist in connecting tech, non-tech teams, and project stakeholders in bringing ideas into digital products or software solutions.
The process starts from ideation and concludes with product features, pricing strategy, and distribution strategy. In the beginning, the processes hover around the area and market. Although the product development process aims to maximize the product value and mitigate the risk, failure occurred due to poor quality, noncompetitive pricing, retard and premature entry, weak promotion, and bad brand awareness.
So, now you would have understood what the software product development process is. Let’s take an in-depth glance into the processes it consists of.
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Step By Step Software Product Development Processes
The software development process is an amalgamation of different processes, and each has its own significance that empowers the complete process with different attributes and insights. Owing to that, many businesses consider product development consulting to do everything right in step by step order. So, let’s take a glance at the step-by-step processes included in software product development for startups.
#1. Brainstorming The Ideas & Planning
Brainstorming is the initial stage of this cycle, where we define the concept for the product. First, it begins with a great idea that you need to carefully think over in order to implement. Besides, the processes can also be termed as idea generation, as we think of every step or stage of the product.
The fact is that a business generates a number of ideas, and a handful is good. The process may include :
- Discussing the project value and idea with the development team
- Gather information from the market or go through the market statistical occurrence
- Describing the concept and idea on a document and sought approval of stakeholders
Once you brainstorm over all the ideas and decide the one to implement, It’s time for planning. Meticulous planning is one core phase of software development. It determines the scope of the project and defines means that can meet strategic business objectives.
Moreover, planning also includes considering resource availability & allocation, cost determination and budgeting, timeframe, and determining solutions. Once the perfect plan is determined, you are ready to move forward. Although having a detailed plan is another perk that can turn out very fruitful.
#2. Product Research & Requirement Analysis
It is critical to have the right product concept in your mind. If you miss out on this, you can fail to validate your idea first and then end up losing precious time in re-considering. Product research and validation enable you to ensure that you are going to develop a product that users will like to pay for, and you won’t be wasting time or money. Here are the ways you can conduct product research to validate your idea.
- Conduct an online survey to get feedback
- Begin a crowdfunding campaign
- Asking for feedback on forums like Quora or Reddit
- Researching in the demand
During this phase, you would be able to define the project in detail and analyze the feasibility. During this process, you need to gather a deeper understanding of the project goal and collect all requirements.
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Moreover, product development engineer carry out the feasibility analysis that allows them to consider all technical and economic aspects and impacts on the development process, time, resources, tasks, team members, and calculating ROI is majorly defined in the feasibility analysis.
Although requirement analysis assists in identifying risks in the beginning stage, it helps identify the risk mitigation strategies that can be implemented from the beginning.
#3. Prototyping & Design
Prototyping is the process of creating the preliminary product to test the design of the product and validate the idea. It enables product developers to cater a solution to stakeholders, which can be used for marketing purposes. Once you develop a prototype, your product starts taking a form.
After prototyping comes the design of the product, where the actual conceptualization of the solution happens. In design, the detailed software architecture gets developed to meet specific project requirements. The custom-tailored software design helps in defining workflow and standards.
(Design Principles In Software Development)
Moreover, it encompasses overall solution design along with the database. In this phase, the complete product is developed as a mockup or prototype for the next stage of custom software development. From features of the solution to defining hardware and software components are inclusive.
#4. Development & Coding
Once the designing has been done, now comes development, which majorly includes code writing and transforming design documents into an actual software project. It is the lengthiest cycle of a software development project, as being the backbone of the process.
The whole process relies on this and a vital thing to pay attention to. The work of the software engineering team is that its code meets the software requirement specification and matches the stakeholder’s requirement. However, the previous stage of software is fulfilled carefully then a ready-to-use software is bound to match the needs.
In this phase, the software release cycle takes place in three stages, including alpha, beta, release to actual product.
#5. Integration & Testing
Now when the software is developed, then comes the next phase involving system testing and integration. The process can vary due to the testing processes. But Typically, QA engineers leverage a wide range of frameworks along with integration executing unit tests, automation compilation, and manual testing.
QA team performs a number of tests, including functional testing, interoperability, system integration, and acceptance testing, etc., in order to ensure that code is clean and the business goals of the solution are met.
Meanwhile, validation and verification are critical aspects of software product development services, ensuring the application/solution is completed successfully. When the software turns into a bug-free solution, deployment starts.
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#6. Implementation and Deployment
It is the process where actual thing-installation happens of the solution. It is a retrospective process after the implementation plan. In this phase, the newly developed and tested application goes forwards to the production stage with the inclusion of data and component transfer.
However, the specific changes will be deployed during the release. Moreover, it can be a straightforward release depending on the complexity of the project. After this, system analysts and end-users can actually try the ready-made application.
#7. Operations & Maintenance
Now comes the final stage, where the software development life cycle includes maintenance and regular updates. The phase is regarded as of utmost importance as you collect the real-world feedback and tweak the solution in order to polish it, enhance, and upgrade the fine-tuned solution.
In this phase, the performance gets looked at, and an upgrade takes place to modify the solution according to need and performance aspects. The actual need of the end-user and new capabilities are met by additional user requirements.
Wrapping Up
As a matter of fact, the software development processes vary from company to company depending on the aim, such as delivering the best quality product that satisfies the need of product demand. Moreover, customer demand is the major aspect targeted during the processes.
The processes of product development engineering can be shaped and altered depending on the need of each particular project, such as app development, a software provider to identify precise action, and the particular goals achieved. At the same time, the process declaration is a foundation measure to arrange the model for defining frameworks and equip team members in both technical and non-technical works.
From the quality of code and solution in general, the expectation needs to meet the project manager’s decision-making progress and more. In the end, the final product is all that matters. Relevant software development processes can help in meeting the customer’s expectations and by well-tailored and great software solutions that meet business needs and offer exceptional customer satisfaction.
However, SDLC helps programmers to stay on top and keep complete information of the project, while the management team can focus on determining the ways to the timely and efficient delivery of software. Moreover, if you have a dedicated product development team, then you can be a step ahead in software engineering and achieve great results.
