With recent changes and technological advancements, Agile Software Development is the new trend for speed and adaptability.
Consumer demands are rapidly changing with time; Agile software development has helped meet the demands through an iterative approach to technology design and development.
What is Agile software development?
This can also be called Agile, a term used to describe the approach to software development promoting flexibility, team collaboration, continual planning, and continual learning instead of trying to deliver it all at once near the end.
This is one of the simplest and most productive processes to turn a vision for a business need into software solutions.
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Overview of Agile software development lifecycle
To have an effective Agile software development process, teams work in sprints, mostly one to three weeks long; instead of delivering a finished product after the development lifecycle, these teams collaborate and give answers on the work in progress during these sprints. This constant communication helps the teams to bring the best, resulting in higher-quality software solutions.
The Agile software development life cycle is the structured cycle of stages that a product goes through from beginning to end. Most teams determine how fast the Agile methodology implementation works.
For instance, Scrum teams work in short periods, known as sprints, related to iterations and have specified roles, such as Scrum master. At the same time, Kanban teams have more of a constant flow with no required roles. Yet, the purpose of all software development teams is to provide working software to users on time.
The Agile software development life cycle involves six stages known as the Agile phases.
Let’s dive into each of them!
6 phases of the Agile Development lifecycle
- Concept
The first phase is also called the scope of their project. This is where a product owner will determine the project’s scope by prioritising the most critical tasks If there are various projects.
Next, the product owner will meet with the client to discuss key requirements and prepare documentation to summarise the project, including what features will be endorsed and the proposed outcomes.
At this stage, the product owner will @also estimate the time and cost of possible projects. This precise research will help them decide whether a project is possible before starting the work. Make the requirements as simple as possible in this phase because you will improve them later.
- Inception
Once the project’s scope is known, the next phase is to develop the software development team.
This stage allows the product owner to assess the availability of their colleagues, select the qualified candidates for the project, and empower them with the needed tools and resources. This allows for the design process to begin.
The team built a user interface mock-up and designed the project architecture. The inception stage involves receiving more feedback from stakeholders to pull out the requirements through a diagram and recognise the product’s functionality. Allow regular check-ins to confirm that key requirements are created in the design phase.
- Iteration
The iteration phase is also called the building stage; it is the longest phase, as most development tasks occur here. Developers will work with UX designers to combine all product rules and customer feedback before completing the design.
However, by the end of the first sprint of this stage, the goal is to build the basic functionality of the product; other features and editions can be added later. This is one of the important stages of Agile software development because it helps developers to create working software quickly and make improvements to satisfy the client.
- Release
The release stage is almost the semi-final stage. This is where the project is almost ready for release. Here The quality assurance team must conduct tests to confirm the software is entirely functional.
These Agile team members will test the system to assure clean code to see if potential bugs or defects are detected, and the developers will deal with them fast. In this phase, User training also takes place, which requires more documentation. When this process is finished, the product’s final iteration can be sent out into production.
Read also: What is software quality assurance and why is it important
- Maintenance
The maintenance phase is where the software will now be deployed and made ready for customers.
This gives the software development team the chance to give their support to ensure that the system runs properly and fixes any new defect.
The team also provides users extra training and ensures they understand how to use the product. However, developers can develop new iterations over time to upgrade the product with developed features.
- Retirement
This is the final life cycle stage, and the product enters the retirement phase for two reasons: replacement by new software or the system has become old or unfit with the organisation over time.
In this phase, the software development team will notify the users of the software retirement and see if the company gets a replacement; if there is one, the users will shift to the new system.
Eventually, developers usually complete any important end-of-life tasks and cancel support for the existing product.
The Agile iteration workflow
During the Agile software development life cycle, there are several iterations in each phase to clean deliverables and deliver extraordinary results.
Here’s how this iteration works.
Agile iterations take two to four weeks, with a completion date. The workflow of an Agile iteration will typically consist of five steps:
- Plan requirements
- Develop product
- Test software
- Deliver iteration
- Incorporate feedback
Each Agile phase will involve various iterations as software developers repeat their methods to improve their product and produce the best software possible.
Conclusions
Executing Agile methodology can be challenging for some companies, mostly if they have a tight schedule or a limited budget. These challenges are why consistent communication and teamwork are important at every level of your Agile Life Cycle.
To support all activities in the Agile cycle, a great team of software developers is needed, and team members will have the right access to the appropriate resources and tools; at Soar digital, we help you spin up that software engineering team to deliver the best Agile project.
