What is Application Development
Application development is the process of designing, building, and implementing software applications. It can be done by massive organizations with large teams working on projects, or by a single freelance developer. Application development defines the process of how the application is made, and generally follows a standard methodology.
There are lots of factors that go into how application development is done. You must consider the size of the project, how specific the requirements are, how much the customer will want to change things, how large the development team is, how experienced the development team is, and the deadline for the project.
Development Lifecycle
The steps included in a lifecycle for developing a computer application are:
- Planning, which involves identifying a need, consideration of solution options, and possibly considering the features of competing applications.
- Analysis, which involves documenting the functional requirements for the app and anticipating potential problems that may be encountered.
- Design, which involves defining how the app will work and what features and components it will have.
- Construction, which is where the actual programming occurs using the requirements and design as a guideline.
- Testing, which involves trying out the app looking for errors and confirming that documented requirements are met.
- Implementation, which involves making the app available for people to use.
- Support, which involves monitoring the user experience. Sometimes recommendations for revisions arise. If those recommendations are pursued, they’ll go through the lifecycle also.