Software development

Software development is the process of conceiving, specifying, designing, programming,

documenting, testing, and bug fixing involved in creating and maintaining applications,
frameworks, or other software components. Software development is a process of writing and
maintaining the source code, but in a broader sense, it includes all that is involved between the
conception of the desired software through to the final manifestation of the software, sometimes
in a planned and structured process.[1] Therefore, software development may include research,
new development, prototyping, modification, reuse, re-engineering, maintenance, or any other
activities that result in software products.[2]

The software can be developed for a variety of purposes, the three most common being to meet
specific needs of a specific client/business (the case with custom software), to meet a perceived
need of some set of potential users (the case with commercial and open source software), or for
personal use (e.g. a scientist may write software to automate a mundane task). Embedded
software development, that is, the development of embedded software, such as used for
controlling consumer products, requires the development process to be integrated with the
development of the controlled physical product. System software underlies applications and the
programming process itself, and is often developed separately.

The need for better quality control of the software development process has given rise to the
discipline of software engineering, which aims to apply the systematic approach exemplified in
the engineering paradigm to the process of software development.

There are many approaches to software project management, known as software development
life cycle models, methodologies, processes, or models. The waterfall model is a traditional
version, contrasted with the more recent innovation of agile software development.

Contents
 1 Methodologies
 2 Software development activities
o 2.1 Identification of need
o 2.2 Planning process
o 2.3 Designing
o 2.4 Implementation, testing and documenting
o 2.5 Deployment and maintenance
 3 Subtopics
o 3.1 View model
o 3.2 Business process and data modelling
o 3.3 Computer-aided software engineering
o 3.4 Integrated development environment
 o 3.5 Modeling language
o 3.6 Programming paradigm
o 3.7 Software reuse
 4 See also
o 4.1 Roles and industry
o 4.2 Specific applications
 5 References
 6 Further reading

Methodologies

A software development process (also known as a software development methodology, model, or

life cycle) is a framework that is used to structure, plan, and control the process of developing
information systems. A wide variety of such frameworks has evolved over the years, each with
its own recognized strengths and weaknesses. There are several different approaches to software
development: some take a more structured, engineering-based approach to develop software,
whereas others may take a more incremental approach, where software evolves as it is developed
piece-by-piece. One system development methodology is not necessarily suitable for use by all
projects. Each of the available methodologies is best suited to specific kinds of projects, based on
various technical, organizational, project and team considerations.[3]

Most methodologies share some combination of the following stages of software development:

 Analyzing the problem

 Market research
 Gathering requirements for the proposed software
 Devising a plan or design for the software
 Implementation (coding) of the software
 Testing the software
 Deployment
 Maintenance and bug fixing

These stages are often referred to collectively as the software development life-cycle, or SDLC.
Different approaches to software development may carry out these stages in different orders, or
devote more or less time to different stages. The level of detail of the documentation produced at
each stage of software development may also vary. These stages may also be carried out in turn
(a “waterfall” based approach), or they may be repeated over various cycles or iterations (a more
"extreme" approach). The more extreme approach usually involves less time spent on planning
and documentation, and more time spent on coding and development of automated tests. More
“extreme” approaches also promote continuous testing throughout the development life-cycle, as
well as having a working (or bug-free) product at all times. More structured or “waterfall” based
approaches attempt to assess the majority of risks and develop a detailed plan for the software
before implementation (coding) begins, and avoid significant design changes and re-coding in
later stages of the software development life-cycle planning.
There are significant advantages and disadvantages to the various methodologies, and the best
approach to solving a problem using software will often depend on the type of problem. If the
problem is well understood and work can be effectively planned out ahead of time, the more
"waterfall" based approach may work the best. If, on the other hand, the problem is unique (at
least to the development team) and the structure of the software cannot be easily envisioned, then
a more "extreme" incremental approach may work best.

Software development activities

Identification of need

The sources of ideas for software products are plentiful. These ideas can come from market
research including the demographics of potential new customers, existing customers, sales
prospects who rejected the product, other internal software development staff, or a creative third
party. Ideas for software products are usually first evaluated by marketing personnel for
economic feasibility, for fit with existing channels distribution, for possible effects on existing
product lines, required features, and for fit with the company's marketing objectives. In a
marketing evaluation phase, the cost and time assumptions become evaluated. A decision is
reached early in the first phase as to whether, based on the more detailed information generated
by the marketing and development staff, the project should be pursued further.[4]

Students of engineering learn engineering and are rarely exposed to finance or marketing.
Students of marketing learn marketing and are rarely exposed to finance or engineering. Most of
us become specialists in just one area. To complicate matters, few of us meet interdisciplinary
people in the workforce, so there are few roles to mimic. Yet, software product planning is
critical to the development success and absolutely requires knowledge of multiple disciplines. [5]

Because software development may involve compromising or going beyond what is required by
the client, a software development project may stray into less technical concerns such as human
resources, risk management, intellectual property, budgeting, crisis management, etc. These
processes may also cause the role of business development to overlap with software
development.

Planning process

Planning is an objective of each and every activity, where we want to discover things that belong
to the project. An important task in creating a software program is extracting the requirements or
requirements analysis.[6] Customers typically have an abstract idea of what they want as an end
result but do not know what software should do. Skilled and experienced software engineers
recognize incomplete, ambiguous, or even contradictory requirements at this point. Frequently
demonstrating live code may help reduce the risk that the requirements are incorrect.

"Although much effort is put in the requirements phase to ensure that requirements are complete
and consistent, rarely that is the case; leaving the software design phase as the most influential
one when it comes to minimizing the effects of new or changing requirements. Requirements
volatility is challenging because they impact future or already going development efforts." [7]
Once the general requirements are gathered from the client, an analysis of the scope of the
development should be determined and clearly stated. This is often called a scope document.

Designing

Once the requirements are established, the design of the software can be established in a software
design document. This involves a preliminary or high-level design of the main modules with an
overall picture (such as a block diagram) of how the parts fit together. The language, operating
system, and hardware components should all be known at this time. Then a detailed or low-level
design is created, perhaps with prototyping as proof-of-concept or to firm up requirements.

Implementation, testing and documenting

Implementation is the part of the process where software engineers actually program the code for
the project.

Software testing is an integral and important phase of the software development process. This
part of the process ensures that defects are recognized as soon as possible. In some processes,
generally known as test-driven development, tests may be developed just before implementation
and serve as a guide for the implementation's correctness.

Documenting the internal design of software for the purpose of future maintenance and
enhancement is done throughout development. This may also include the writing of an API, be it
external or internal. The software engineering process chosen by the developing team will
determine how much internal documentation (if any) is necessary. Plan-driven models (e.g.,
Waterfall) generally produce more documentation than Agile models.

Deployment and maintenance

Deployment starts directly after the code is appropriately tested, approved for release, and sold or
otherwise distributed into a production environment. This may involve installation,
customization (such as by setting parameters to the customer's values), testing, and possibly an
extended period of evaluation.[citation needed]

Software training and support is important, as software is only effective if it is used correctly.
[citation needed]

Maintaining and enhancing software to cope with newly discovered faults or requirements can
take substantial time and effort, as missed requirements may force redesign of the software. [citation
needed]
. In most cases maintenance is required on regular basis to fix reported issues and keep the
software running.

Subtopics
View model
The TEAF Matrix of Views and Perspectives.

A view model is a framework that provides the viewpoints on the system and its environment, to
be used in the software development process. It is a graphical representation of the underlying
semantics of a view.

The purpose of viewpoints and views is to enable human engineers to comprehend very complex
systems and to organize the elements of the problem around domains of expertise. In the
engineering of physically intensive systems, viewpoints often correspond to capabilities and
responsibilities within the engineering organization.[8]

Most complex system specifications are so extensive that no one individual can fully
comprehend all aspects of the specifications. Furthermore, we all have different interests in a
given system and different reasons for examining the system's specifications. A business
executive will ask different questions of a system make-up than would a system implementer.
The concept of viewpoints framework, therefore, is to provide separate viewpoints into the
specification of a given complex system. These viewpoints each satisfy an audience with interest
in some set of aspects of the system. Associated with each viewpoint is a viewpoint language
that optimizes the vocabulary and presentation for the audience of that viewpoint.

Business process and data modelling

Graphical representation of the current state of information provides a very effective means for
presenting information to both users and system developers.
example of the interaction between business process and data models.[9]

 A business model illustrates the functions associated with the business process being
modeled and the organizations that perform these functions. By depicting activities and
information flows, a foundation is created to visualize, define, understand, and validate
the nature of a process.
 A data model provides the details of information to be stored and is of primary use when
the final product is the generation of computer software code for an application or the
preparation of a functional specification to aid a computer software make-or-buy
decision. See the figure on the right for an example of the interaction between business
process and data models.[9]

Usually, a model is created after conducting an interview, referred to as business analysis. The
interview consists of a facilitator asking a series of questions designed to extract required
information that describes a process. The interviewer is called a facilitator to emphasize that it is
the participants who provide the information. The facilitator should have some knowledge of the
process of interest, but this is not as important as having a structured methodology by which the
questions are asked of the process expert. The methodology is important because usually a team
of facilitators is collecting information across the facility and the results of the information from
all the interviewers must fit together once completed.[9]

The models are developed as defining either the current state of the process, in which case the
final product is called the "as-is" snapshot model, or a collection of ideas of what the process
should contain, resulting in a "what-can-be" model. Generation of process and data models can
be used to determine if the existing processes and information systems are sound and only need
minor modifications or enhancements, or if re-engineering is required as a corrective action. The
creation of business models is more than a way to view or automate your information process.
Analysis can be used to fundamentally reshape the way your business or organization conducts
its operations.[9]

Computer-aided software engineering

Computer-aided software engineering (CASE), in the field software engineering, is the scientific
application of a set of software tools and methods to the development of software which results
in high-quality, defect-free, and maintainable software products.[10] It also refers to methods for
the development of information systems together with automated tools that can be used in the
software development process.[11] The term "computer-aided software engineering" (CASE) can
refer to the software used for the automated development of systems software, i.e., computer
code. The CASE functions include analysis, design, and programming. CASE tools automate
methods for designing, documenting, and producing structured computer code in the desired
programming language.[12]

Two key ideas of Computer-aided Software System Engineering (CASE) are:[13]

 Foster computer assistance in software development and software maintenance processes,

and
 An engineering approach to software development and maintenance.

Typical CASE tools exist for configuration management, data modeling, model transformation,
refactoring, source code generation.

Integrated development environment

Anjuta, a C and C++ IDE for the GNOME environment

An integrated development environment (IDE) also known as integrated design environment or

integrated debugging environment is a software application that provides comprehensive
facilities to computer programmers for software development. An IDE normally consists of a:

 Source code editor,

 Compiler or interpreter,
 Build automation tools, and
 Debugger (usually).
IDEs are designed to maximize programmer productivity by providing tight-knit components
with similar user interfaces. Typically an IDE is dedicated to a specific programming language,
so as to provide a feature set which most closely matches the programming paradigms of the
language.

Modeling language

A modeling language is any artificial language that can be used to express information or
knowledge or systems in a structure that is defined by a consistent set of rules. The rules are used
for interpretation of the meaning of components in the structure. A modeling language can be
graphical or textual.[14] Graphical modeling languages use a diagram techniques with named
symbols that represent concepts and lines that connect the symbols and that represent
relationships and various other graphical annotation to represent constraints. Textual modeling
languages typically use standardised keywords accompanied by parameters to make computer-
interpretable expressions.

Examples of graphical modelling languages in the field of software engineering are:

 Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN, and the XML form BPML) is an example
of a process modeling language.
 EXPRESS and EXPRESS-G (ISO 10303-11) is an international standard general-purpose
data modeling language.
 Extended Enterprise Modeling Language (EEML) is commonly used for business process
modeling across layers.
 Flowchart is a schematic representation of an algorithm or a stepwise process,
 Fundamental Modeling Concepts (FMC) modeling language for software-intensive
systems.
 IDEF is a family of modeling languages, the most notable of which include IDEF0 for
functional modeling, IDEF1X for information modeling, and IDEF5 for modeling
ontologies.
 LePUS3 is an object-oriented visual Design Description Language and a formal
specification language that is suitable primarily for modelling large object-oriented (Java,
C++, C#) programs and design patterns.
 Specification and Description Language (SDL) is a specification language targeted at the
unambiguous specification and description of the behaviour of reactive and distributed
systems.
 Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a general-purpose modeling language that is an
industry standard for specifying software-intensive systems. UML 2.0, the current
version, supports thirteen different diagram techniques and has widespread tool support.

Not all modeling languages are executable, and for those that are, using them doesn't necessarily
mean that programmers are no longer needed. On the contrary, executable modeling languages
are intended to amplify the productivity of skilled programmers, so that they can address more
difficult problems, such as parallel computing and distributed systems.

Programming paradigm
A programming paradigm is a fundamental style of computer programming, which is not
generally dictated by the project management methodology (such as waterfall or agile).
Paradigms differ in the concepts and abstractions used to represent the elements of a program
(such as objects, functions, variables, constraints) and the steps that comprise a computation
(such as assignations, evaluation, continuations, data flows). Sometimes the concepts asserted by
the paradigm are utilized cooperatively in high-level system architecture design; in other cases,
the programming paradigm's scope is limited to the internal structure of a particular program or
module.

A programming language can support multiple paradigms. For example, programs written in C+
+ or Object Pascal can be purely procedural, or purely object-oriented, or contain elements of
both paradigms. Software designers and programmers decide how to use those paradigm
elements. In object-oriented programming, programmers can think of a program as a collection
of interacting objects, while in functional programming a program can be thought of as a
sequence of stateless function evaluations. When programming computers or systems with many
processors, process-oriented programming allows programmers to think about applications as
sets of concurrent processes acting upon logically shared data structures.

Just as different groups in software engineering advocate different methodologies, different

programming languages advocate different programming paradigms. Some languages are
designed to support one paradigm (Smalltalk supports object-oriented programming, Haskell
supports functional programming), while other programming languages support multiple
paradigms (such as Object Pascal, C++, C#, Visual Basic, Common Lisp, Scheme, Python,
Ruby, and Oz).

Many programming paradigms are as well known for what methods they forbid as for what they
enable. For instance, pure functional programming forbids using side-effects; structured
programming forbids using goto statements. Partly for this reason, new paradigms are often
regarded as doctrinaire or overly rigid by those accustomed to earlier styles.[citation needed] Avoiding
certain methods can make it easier to prove theorems about a program's correctness, or simply to
understand its behavior.

Examples of high-level paradigms include:

 Aspect-oriented software development

 Domain-specific modeling
 Model-driven engineering
 Object-oriented programming methodologies
o Grady Booch's object-oriented design (OOD), also known as object-oriented
analysis and design (OOAD). The Booch model includes six diagrams: class,
object, state transition, interaction, module, and process.[15]
 Search-based software engineering
 Service-oriented modeling
 Structured programming
 Top-down and bottom-up design
 o Top-down programming: evolved in the 1970s by IBM researcher Harlan Mills
(and Niklaus Wirth) in developed structured programming.

Software reuse

A definition of software reuse is the process of creating software from predefined software
components. A software reuse approach seeks to increase or maximise the use of existing
software artefacts in the software development lifecycle.
The following are some common software reuse methods:

 A software framework is a reusable design or implementation for a software system or

subsystem.
 Component-based software engineering involves integrating together existing
components to create an application.
 Service-oriented architectures or service-oriented programming builds upon the concept
of components to provide networked services, such as web services.
 Software product lines seek to develop software based upon a common set of 'core' assets
and process, in order to produce a range of products (or 'applications') for a particular
market.
 API (Application programming interface, establish a set of "subroutine definitions,
protocols, and tools for building application software" which can be utilised in future
builds.

15. Open Source documentations, via libraries such as GitHub, provide free code for
software developers to re-use and implement into 0130473766.

Further reading

 Kit, Edward (1992). Software Testing in The Real World. Addison-Wesley Professional.
ISBN 0201877562.
 McCarthy, Jim (1995). Dynamics of Software Development. Microsoft Press.
ISBN 1556158238.
 Conde, Dan (2002). Software Product Management: Managing Software Development
from Idea to Product to Marketing to Sales. Aspatore Books. ISBN 1587622025.
 Davis, A. M. (2005). Just enough requirements management: Where software
development meets marketing. Dorset House Publishing Company, Incorporated.
ISBN 0932633641.
 Hasted, Edward (2005). Software That Sells: A Practical Guide to Developing and
Marketing Your Software Project. Wiley Publishing. ISBN 0764597833.
 Hohmann, Luke (2003). Beyond Software Architecture: Creating and Sustaining Winning
Solutions. Addison-Wesley Professional. ISBN 0201775948.
 John W. Horch (2005). "Two Orientations On How To Work With Objects." In: IEEE
Software. vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 117–118, Mar., 1995.
 Rittinghouse, John (2003). Managing Software Deliverables: A Software Development
Management Methodology. Digital Press. ISBN 155558313X.
 Wiegers, Karl E. (2005). More About Software Requirements: Thorny Issues and
Practical Advice. Microsoft Press. ISBN 0735622671.
 Wysocki, Robert K. (2006). Effective Software Project Management. Wiley.
ISBN 0764596365