Program development life cycle
This refers to the steps that have to be followed in coming up with an application program.
These steps are followed irrespective of whether the program is developed in-house or not.
The program development life cycle consists of the following stages:
1. Problem analysis- The first stage of the program development cycle i.e. the problem analysis phase is primarily concerned with establishing why the program is being developed. The objectives of the
program are documented. The process of establishing program objectives involves gathering information from end users. The end product of this stage is the program definition document.
2. Program design- Once the requirements of the program to be developed have been understood, the second phase is to design a program that meets those requirements as documented in the first stage.
Tools that may be utilized in program design include program flowcharts and structured English statements. The end product of the design phase is the program design specification.
3. Program coding- Program coding is concerned with turning the program design into program code (in a high level language). The systems analyst and the programmers work together to decide on the programming language to use. The end product of the coding phase is program code.
4. Program testing- Program testing is concerned with locating errors in the program so that the errors can be fixed to reduce future program maintenance costs, to create customer confidence, to improve
system reliability and to improve program quality. The end product of the testing phase is an improved program in terms of reliability.
5. Program documentation- Program documentation involves producing documents that describe the delivered program. Program documentation also involves producing documents that contain the outcomes of the other phases of program development i.e. problem analysis, program design, program coding, and program testing. Documents that are produced include program user guides, program specification and program documentation (Contains a technical description of the developed system for use by programmers for purposes such as maintenance). The program documentation phase is thus an on-going phase featuring from the start to the end of the program development life cycle.
6. Program maintenance- Program maintenance includes the correction of faults that existed in the program before its delivery as well as changes to improve performance or to adapt the program to a changing environment (hardware and software environment). The end product of the program maintenance phase is an improved system.
Wilfykil answered the question on March 1, 2019 at 07:13