Custom Software Development Process- Stages and Methods You Should Know

Data Hygiene

Data can play a vital role in overall performance and usability of software. Whether it is customer data, usage data, or even training data, it is necessary to keep it secure every time. Companies should maintain data hygiene throughout their plants and tools like Git. Simply put, software development service providers need to get the necessary data in a clean and secure way for developing robust solutions.

Review Process

The code review process is necessary to ensure that the team of software developers adheres to coding guidelines and follows the best practices. This review is also useful in preventing bugs and improving the code quality. Though it may take a long time, it is essential to make standards for reviewing software code regularly during the development process. However, once the development company standardize the process, it will accelerate the cycle time.

Code Quality

The source code can play a pivotal role in the functionality of bespoke software. Low quality code can hamper the performance, and therefore, maintaining high-quality code is essential. Code with high quality can increase the chances for your software to meet the client’s expectations and enables the development team to stay agile. Though writing such code can take some time, but it is a useful investment.

Workflow Optimization

When you hire software developers , it is necessary for them to optimize their workflow. It can help them meet the deadline and develop a tailored software with optimum performance. DevOps and other emerging concepts can help developers optimize workflows by streamlining processes and make the development process less time-consuming. However, it is necessary to consider various aspects for ensuring workflow optimization.

Accurate Planning

Consistency and accuracy are of utmost important in custom software development services. When developers deliver what they say consistently, it can help clients get the seamless and secure software as and when they need. Though accurate planning needs effort, it can streamline the process over the period and save valuable time of developers. Moreover, software development companies plan accurately to accomplish multiple projects effectively.

As per the Statista report, the number of software developers is expected to reach 28.7 million by 2024 . They need to follow the standard practices for SDLC to meet the project deadline effectively, and without compromising on performance.

Image Source :- Statista report

Let’s go through the key steps for developing bespoke business software for your company.

Requirement Gathering and Analysis

First things first. Software development process initiates with the blueprint or planning. Once you hire software developers, they initiate the process to collect and analyse your project requirements. Developers analyse the project based on medium to long-term business goals and market trends. When analysing the project, it is essential to check whether software will make tasks easier and bring automation in several processes.

Design and Prototyping

Once the planning is over, developers start the process for creating architecture for your business software. It will define the complete workflow as designers take care of both appearance and the overall performance for your software. All you need to explain the objectives and ideas behind developing the business software. Designers can assist you to define how the prospective users will interact with the software at this stage.

Development

It is the most crucial stage that decides the destiny of software! The development stage begins after the team of developers gets the plan with the design and necessary features. It involves writing the necessary code based on project requirements. Though it is the riskiest phase, a reputed software development company can handle it with the necessary expertise and experience of in-house team of developers.

Testing

It is a part of development process as QA executives perform testing alongside software development. Testing can check the functionality, stability, and usability of the software during the ongoing development process. Most custom software development service providers have a separate team of QA testers for analysing every code manually and using automated tools. Development companies keep comprehensive approach through dedicated QA teams .

Deployment

This stage comes after development and testing in the SDLC. Once the company approves the software for functionality and stability, deployment on the necessary servers and devices can be done. It is beneficial to come up with an Alpha release before deploying your software on multiple servers. In this Alpha release, a small group of users can use the software and give their feedback. You can make the necessary modifications based on these valuable suggestions in a Beta release in which more users can access to your software.

Maintenance and Support

Your custom software needs maintenance and updates on regular basis. In other words, deployment or go-live is not the last phase of the custom software development process. You need to upgrade it regularly for maintaining its performance and attracting more people. Software maintenance offers many business benefits to your company. You can ask for maintenance and 24x7 technical assistance from the software development company.

After understanding six critical steps, let’s understand the methodologies to build custom software solutions.