Working in a fast-paced digital organization where software development requirement changes according to the latest trend require a software development cycle life (SDLC) that is adaptive and responsive. There are various SDLC models including the waterfall model, incremental model, V-model, spiral model, and so on. Among all these models, the best is the agile model that is mostly used in the tech industry to deliver small pieces of working software quickly. One of the main reasons for choosing agile over other models is that it works in the iterative manner.
So, today our main talk is all about the agile development methodology! Let’s begin with the definition of what basically agile is.
What is Agile?
The software development life cycle that follows the concept of iterative development is known as agile. Agile makes the development process quicker, more effective, and adaptive to the changing needs and requirements. It’s a smart Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) that helps the team to work with the changing market trends that are high in demand. Agile helps teams to quickly respond to the fast-paced change of customer needs.
Customer feedback is essential in agile development to ensure the product delivered is fulfilling their requirements. The process in this SDLC is broken down into small sprints or iterations that are completed in a month or a week. Each sprint should be in the form of a prototype, draught, or practical version of the final deliverables, and the length of each sprint is determined at the start of the project.
Software requirements, plans, and results are continuously monitored and evaluated within this SDLC. There are different agile development frameworks such as Kanban, Scrum, extreme programming (XP), Dynamic Systems Development (DSDM), etc. to build highly effective and functional software while maintaining the quality of the product.
What are the key benefits of agile?
The following are the benefits that are provided by agile software methodology to your organization.
More control: Work can be readily broken down into short iteration cycles by the development team. The development team has better control over the process because it allows them to work swiftly and according to fresh updates and needs.
Improved productivity: Agile’s incremental nature ensures that products are released rapidly and changes can be made easily at any point during the SDLC, resulting in increased productivity.
Reduce risk: Agile aids in the rapid identification and prediction of risk and problems. It enables the team to devise effective mitigation strategies.
Adaptive to change: The software team’s use of agile methodology allows them to respond quickly to client feedback. Adapting to changes to increase product quality.
Higher Return on Investment: Using Agile SDLC, the project team can get the software to market faster. It reduced the cost of development and the time it took to bring a product to market. The team can improve their return on investment and sales.
Different stages of agile development life cycle
The process of agile development is divided into the following stages:
- Project planning
The first phase of the agile development life cycle is the planning where the planning of the project is carried out in general. The project manager and stakeholders discuss the objectives and goals of the project with the team members. The project scope, budget, timeline, and milestones to be achieved are identified in this phase. The purpose of the project is to discuss with the team to know the importance of developing a project.
The importance of project planning in ensuring smooth communication amongst team members cannot be overstated. If, on the other hand, the team has had a thorough discussion and planning of the project, the odds of success are higher. Because the group is well-versed in the project’s overall requirements. Each team member is given a specific assignment that must be completed within a certain amount of time.
- Analysis requirement
After the planning, the requirement gathering and analysis of the project take place. This is the important phase as the project that is going to be developed must fulfill your client’s needs and requirements. You can ask the client regarding the purpose of creating software, and what goals are needed to be accomplished through the software. Gather information about the project and know the end-users. You’ll have a better understanding of the client’s needs and requirements by gathering the information. After this, distribute the work into a small sprint, and assign tasks to each team member.
- Design
The design, structure, and prototype of the software are created by coordinating with the designer of the project. There are two types of design level known as low-fidelity design level and high-fidelity design level. The low-fidelity is concerned with the creation of a rough sketch to get the user flow of the project. At this phase, the team itself tests the design. High-fidelity, on the other hand, is about creating a software-based prototype. The prototype design is essential to get an overview of the project that how the software will work in real life before it is put into production. The design is then tested with the end-users, and shared with the client to get it approved.
- Implementation
The implementation or coding of the software is the critical phase in which the actual code of the project is written. Many programming languages and frameworks are available that you can choose according to your project requirement. The developer implements the functionalities and other features of the project that were discussed with the client. Coding of the software and database designing are the steps involved in this phase. After this, the code is linked with the database to ensure the software is completely functional. The developer can make changes in the software afterward as agile methodology welcomes changes and allow developers to add new features and functionalities quickly and easily.
- Testing
Code developed in the fourth step goes under the testing phase by the quality assurance team. The QA team identify bugs or defect in the project by testing different codes of the project. Testing is crucial to ensure the software performs well in terms of speed, functionality, and usability. The QA team creates test cases and conducts several sorts of testing, including functional testing, integration testing, load testing, accessibility testing, usability testing, regression testing, etc. The software is tested by end-users before it is released to ensure usability, as it is critical to give a positive user experience that will lead to the success of the software developed.
- Deployment
The Agile team distributes the software to the cloud or an on premise server once it is ready for release. The software is deployed at the server-side or in the production environment to ensure its running and working well on a target device. The deployment of the project makes you satisfied that everything is in order as planned and the software is not facing is any problem while operating on the producer side as well as the consumer side. Accurate updates, software, maintenance activities, and uninstall can all be targeted automatically with software deployment, and PCs may be checked for issues in real-time. Software deployment is usually done in iterations, with one feature being developed and released at a time.
- Review
Once the deployment phase is completed, the next step is to move toward the feedback and review stage. The work is reviewed by the manager and stakeholder, to ensure the project is meeting the desired requirements. After reviewing the first stage of the software, the development team moves toward the next iteration or stage. If there are any changes in the first stage, then it’s iterated.
- Launch
The software is launched to the market after it’s completely tested and reviewed. You can launch on different platforms to grab more audiences. At this time, your user will download your software and use it for a specific purpose. For better reach, you can advertise or market it on different social media platforms. This is the best way to attract more customers and to make it reach a large target audience.
- Maintenance
The software goes through the maintenance phase to keep it up to date with the latest features and functionalities. The new software updates help you to keep the software free from technical issues. The speed and performance of the software are improved with faster and quicker installations. Moreover, you must keep your software up to date to scan for different viruses and vulnerabilities. The security of the software is also improved with maintenance. You can also keep a backup of your software.
Final words
As of now, we can conclude that agile is one the best development methodology that has amazing benefits. The team can develop a project effectively while meeting the new changes of the project. The small iteration and a sprint of agile make the work more manageable. After the successful completion of the first iteration, the team moves to the second iteration, and so on until the final completion stage. Moreover, the different stages of the agile SDLC help you in delivering a quality project.
Author bio:
Linda Hartley is a digital marketing manager in APPSTIRR, custom software Development Company, who loves to write content on the latest topics, including Blockchain, B2B business models, application development and much more.