A comparison of Software

Development Methodologies
Apr 5, 2013
Anirudh Oswal
 Software development methodologies
Code and Fix
Least formal model
The coder uses whatever
informal design, code and
test tools he/she chooses
The requirements may or
may not be formally written
Description
Unstructured
Key Informal
Characteristics
There is no process
overhead
There is no training or
expertise necessary
Advantages
There is no planning and
control over the
development process
Leads to spaghetti code
Disadvantages
Waterfall
Follows a strict structure of
phases
Requirements Gathering
Design
Development
Coding
Testing
Implementation
Each phase requires the
previous phase to be
complete
Structured
Linear and simple
Easy to manage large and
complex projects when the
requirements and scope can
be clearly defined and dont
keep changing
Can be outsourced
Produces robust
documentation
Requirements and design
changes cause complexity
lead to a lot of rework
Success of the project
depends on the correctness
and completeness of each
phase
RUP
Rational Unified Model or
RUP is structured but
iterative
Each iterative step involves
four phases
Inception
Elaboration
Construction
Transition
Iterations overlap
Each iteration outputs a
working solution that is
incremental to the previous
Structured
Evolutionary
As changes can be pushed
into future releases there is
less time pressure on
development
Risk is managed and exposed
early
Software evolves and is not
produced in one huge effort
The approach is complex and
can easily get disorganized
Highly customizable and thus
causes confusion in larger
teams
Requires experts
Agile Spiral
An expert development team Iterative and focused on risk
produced a minimal mitigation
application with limited Each iterative step involves
feature sets are developed four phases
delivered in sprints, short Planning
working spans of 2-4 weeks Evaluation
Releases are iterative and Risk analysis
necessarily incremental Engineering
Iterative Iterative
Incremental Low risk
Lean
Open to change in Risk mitigation leads to
requirement and scope increased success rate
Flexible Strong approval
Works when requirements documentation and control
are unclear at the beginning Great for mission critical
of the project projects
Outsourcing is hard due to Requires highly skilled
high level of client interaction people to execute on all four
Managing many stakeholders phases
is hard Multiple iterations add
Difficult to apply in large overhead
projects with several
stakeholders and team
members