Running head: LIFE CYCLE RESEARCH 1

Life Cycle Research

Krishna Shiva Mounika

Apexa Patel

Jayadeep Pakala

Ram Gopal Varma

IST 7020 Analysis, Modeling and Design

Wilmington University
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Introduction

Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is a methodological process that describes the

life cycle of software development. It describes the entire lifecycle of the software development

process from planning to programming (creating) to implementation, testing and maintaining.

Each step or phase in the SDLC is provides specific guidance or requirements as to how the

software development should proceed according to the requirements. SDLC has many different

models for the development lifecycle such as iterative, waterfall, open-source, etc. all of them have

unique methodologies for software development. We shall discuses two of the SDLC

methodologies in details below. Satao (2012) discussed in journal that “A software life cycle model

is either a descriptive or prescriptive characterization of how software is or should be developed”.

SDLC Seven Step Methodology

The seven step or phase methodology consist of the following seven steps, 1) Planning, 2)

Analysis, 3) Design, 4) Development, 5) Testing 6) Implementation and 7) Maintains.

 Planning – This is the first step and the most important step. In this step feasibility study for

a business initiative considering the cost, time, resources, etc. for the specific project (Massey,

V., & Satao, K., 2012). The major purpose is to find the problem or the scope of the project

and determine what is the best solution to that business problem. We also determine which

development model will be used.

 Analysis – This phase is sometimes called Systems Analysis and Requirements phase. In this

phase all the necessities of the business end-client are broken down and also the operations

goals are categorized (Mishra, A., &Dubey, D., 2013). Basically the analyst finds problems

and submits solutions for the specific business problems along with project goals and function
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of the intended product. Many tools are used to find requirements gathering and structured

requirements along with budget and schedule.

 Design – This phase is an important phase, as it defines how the product will be developed. In

this phase we define all the details about the software product like the features, specifications,

user-interface and all the functional requirements. Prototype and wire framing along with

standards, pseudo code and some documentation work is also done in this phase.

 Development – In this phase the actual coding takes place. Once the design documents are

received the work is then divided into several different modules and the coding work is then

started. The company may hire developers, database developers and sometimes network

engineers to build the system/product. This is also the longest phase of the SDLC.

 Testing – In this phase the product which has been developed is test along with validation and

verification. The project goes through multiple series of testing to ensure that the product does

not have any software bugs and if the product meets the requirements including interoperability

(Mishra, A., &Dubey, D., 2013). This phase also ensures that the business requirement that

meets with the prerequisites set in the planning and analysis phase (Massey, V., & Satao, K.,

2012). If the testing does not meet the requirements the products is again send to development

phase where it is improved and tested again.

 Implementation – In this stage the software is ready for the production environment. The

software is slowly implemented either in a phased manner or during off-peak hours. This phase

is also known as the realization of the project.

 Maintenance – This is the final phase with deals with the maintenance of the software product

after it is delivered and implemented. Any further changes like bug fixing, additional features,

performance improvements, UX design changes, etc. fall in this stage of the SDLC. If there is
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a business case for any other the above changes then the entire SDLC life cycle process is used

again, as it is not advice to skip or over look any steps in the SDLC.

Differences

After studying both the models of the SDLC, we can say that both the models are suited

for different levels of software development. For example, the seven-step model is more suited for

low risk projects while the four-step model is more for the medium and high-risk projects. Since

the four steps model requires executive decision more frequently there is changes that certain risk

are mitigated. Also when considering the cost, the four step model is more expensive and therefore

suited for medium to large projects while the seven step model is cost effective when compared to

the four step model. The four stage model is also very adaptable and flexible than the seven stage

model. Finally, the execution of the seven stage model is quite easy than the four step model. The

customer relationship with seven stage model is toward the beginning stage only while with four

stage models it's all through the undertaking (Sharma & Singh, 2015). Hazard association with

seven stage is ordinarily high as contrast with four stage model.

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Conclusion

In conclusion we can find many different SDLC models suited from large-scale projects

with complex development cycle and high-risk to the inexpensive software development. The

usage really depends the on the scope the end-user requirements along with the cost and scheduling

flexibilities. In this paper we just looked at the two different SDLC models and how they different

in their steps for the development cycle. Which model best suits the requirements are decided in

the early phase depending on the requirements, the complexities, cost and time constrains.
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Reference

Massey, V., & Satao, K. J. (2012, April 1). Evolving a New Software Development Life Cycle

Model (SDLC) incorporated with Release Management - PDF. Retrieved from

http://docplayer.net/5455758-Evolving-a-new-software-development-life-cycle-model-

sdlc-incorporated-with-release-management.html

Maheshwari, S., & Jain, D. (2012). A Comparative Analysis of Different types of Models in

Software Development Life Cycle. International Journal of Advanced Research in

Computer Science and Software Engineering, 2(5), 285-289. Retrieved from

http://www.ijarcsse.com/docs/papers/May2012/Volum2_issue5/V2I500405.pdf

Mishra, A., &Dubey, D. (2013, October 1). A Comparative Study of Different Software

Development Life Cycle Models in Different Scenarios. Retrieved

from http://www.ijarcsms.com/docs/paper/volume1/issue5/V1I5-0008.pdf

Sharma, P., & Singh, D. (2015, April 1). Comparative Study of Various SDLC Models on

Different Parameters. Retrieved from

http://www.ijer.in/ijer/publication/v4s4/IJER_2015_405.pdf