Why software development & testing practices are essential
Software development in 2019
Approximately 29% of software development companies have no plans to switch
their existing programming language. Companies are certainly driving themselves
to stability in niche expertise. It can be easily adjudged that the core
objective of a majority of businesses to create USPs around software
development quality standards. But there is a twist.
Despite
extensively adapted data-driven approach, approximately 27% of companies do not use any credible software development performance
metrics. It certainly gives rise to the opportunity of enhancing software
performance with the best software development and testing practices.
Despite a significant shift in focus towards mobile apps, it is essential to
understand that the core of every product idea will always reside within the
web-based resources and websites. Ultimately, they will enhance your brand
reputation.
Software
development and testing techniques are extremely crucial in the highly
competitive IT business space. It is a commonly known fact that the IT industry
faces budget overruns and mismanagement of time material resources. It is very
critical to understand and demand close follow-ups of the best software development
and testing practices. Good software development practices enable you to:
§ Cover budget overrun
§ Deliver before time
§ Exceed functional requirements
§ Outperform non-functional requirements
§ Boost productivity
§ Build client satisfaction
Best software
development practices
Always choose
an agile SDLC model
Choosing an
agile software development lifecycle model is a must for every company. It is
important to deal with agile methodologies sophisticatedly through spiral,
waterfall, agile, and rapid development lifecycle models. Each model has a
distinctive approach, which is different from the other. Such a model can be
chosen depending upon factors like cost, the scale of the project, and the
clients’ mindset towards requirements and probabilities of dynamic
requirements.
Another great
option is to choose between an MVP or EVP. You may go for a minimum viable
product (MVP) or an exceptionally viable product (EVP) depending upon cost and
functionality constraints.
What are
agile methodologies?
Agile
methodologies should not be confused with a particular SDLC. It is an
overall 360° approach comprising of routines and practices that help you cover
the dynamics of business and floating requirements. It runs through the project
and client-handling at different points in time during the project. Software
Development Companies should never underestimate the abilities of SAFe, scrum
coaches, and agile masters. It is always a beneficial resource to have at your
hand-stretch when you hire a scrum master or project consultant for high-level
project management.
Never leave
unsecured APIs
Instances like:
§ Compromised banking details in UPI frameworks
§ Easy cyber attacks on the Aadhaar platform
§ Automatic registration of existing Truecaller users for native UPI
service
are results of unsecured APIs. The best software development
practices always include bulletproof security of functional code and
smaller automation code snippets. They form an indispensable part of the
software routine for the product development lifecycle. Software development
companies and technology enthusiasts can look up to new age DevSecOps
practices.
They can also
enable the resources with the latest SSL protocols for client-server gateways.
It is essential to take note that, by default, all application layer tools are not
using any encryption protocols or data privacy measures.
For instance,
let us take say a software development project requires suggestive search
technology. You plan to use Elastic for it. The database abstraction models and
mappings in a non-relational database are all uncovered. They are soft targets
for people with malicious intentions. Thus, it is always good to use either
native for third party security measures for all your tools and
resources.
Focus on
dependency injections
The best
software development practices include permanent solutions to all possible
dependency injection. Development frameworks that interact with tools need
serious attention with a troubleshooting mind. It can be quickly done by a very
sophisticated approach in choosing the right technology stack. Further, you
should look for compatible tools that go with your platform or the native
mobile app framework (either of them is a must). Whichever makes a larger share
of your overall software project, your dependency management efforts should be
aligned in that particular direction.
Make proper
use of software development quality metrics
Software
development quality metrics form a very integral part of the best software
development & testing practices. The level of software development quality
metrics will eventually determine your approach for rigorously testing the
application software for high octane performance. Companies should make use of
third-party resources, quality metrics, and project management tools but
fundamental concepts like:
§ Coupling
§ Cohesion
§ Object-oriented software development concepts
§ Optimized lines of code
are essential
for reduced response time.
It is logically
proven that the best software development and testing techniques can
only be demonstrated with the right combination of in-house and offshore teams.
It is vital to building an in-house team for repetitive long-term tasks which
increase the cost feasibility.
While super
niche and expertise demanding development tasks should be outsourced to the
best web development company. Quality is of utmost
importance, but it is highly critical to ensure the shrinking time material
cost as well. Keeping your options open for outsourcing custom development
tasks is equally beneficial in software development and testing phase. There is
a particular task of critical automation and cloud-scaled testing, which you
can easily outsource cost-effectively.
Build easy-to-deploy tech stacks, focus on containerized deployment
Using the right
set of technology tools and the most appropriate development framework is the
pivot of software development strategy. It is the most critical decision of any
software development project. The choice of a tech stack depends upon:
§ Scalability
§ Availability of developers
§ Complexities of requirements
§ Nature of technology business
§ Compatibility with tools. and
§ Difficulty in deployment.
Please note
that the choice of software development frameworks and languages should never
be influenced by the buzzwords you may come across on the Internet. Nor, it
should be driven by any finely propagated technology framework. There should be
a multi-dimensional analysis of business requirements against the framework
capabilities of all possible programming languages and development
frameworks.
The advice is
best validated by the fact that despite so many new-age development options,
PHP and JavaScript are still among the most used languages. IT is because of
the proven potential and tested capabilities in real-time business environments
and scalable technology platforms.
Best software
testing practices
Uncompromised testing environment security
The development
environment should be strictly characterized very similar to your deployment
environment. Similarly, the testing environment should be very similar to a
user environment. It is often witnessed that companies try to create user-like
testing environments on production platforms. The user data privacy and
internal application security are generally undervalued. It leads to
significant compromises which can hamper the product reputation, performance,
and possibilities of future expansion.
Use test
management tools
Best software
testing practices foster capabilities of software test management tools like
Zephyr, Hiptest, and Practitest. These are very useful for safeguarding
ultimate objectives in a custom software project. They are accommodating in
containerized deployment. They come with an analytics dashboard where you can
use the various monitor types
of software testing techniques. It also helps
in executable testing approach because of the time management and natural
phase-tracking capabilities.
Focus on
automating the right tests
Cost
feasibility and crunch timelines often drive the best software testing
practices towards advance applications of automated testing. But there is a huge
catch here. Please understand that not all test cases and test suites are up
for blind automation. Such an extremist approach leads to compromised software
development outcomes and performance. It is essential to handpick certain test
cases that demand large scale repetition and high precision all around the
routine. It helps you build an all-round strategy comprising of automation,
user-based, and manually monitored tests.
Keep checking
for full test suite coverage
Even the best
software testing practices are of no use if the test suite (and the overall
regime) is unable to provide 100% coverage to all functional requirements. It
should directly lead to desired performance metrics. Please do not look for any
tool that can help you ensure total coverage of your needs. Project
consultants, developers, and a close working software development team must
ensure it at various points in time during the software development project.
The best
software testing practices can help you thrive for unparalleled software
performance. While looking for fantastic performance results, it is crucial to
ensure dynamic user scalability of the application software. It often happens
that rigorously tested applications are not capable of handling active user
requests. It eventually increases the response time, overall turnaround time of
fetching data, and spoils the overall customer experience.
You may use
cloud computing powered cloud-scaled environment, which helps you increase the
number of active users on application software at any point in time. It also
lets them perform all permutations and combinations of user journeys possible
within the application software. It is an excellent way of analyzing
performance and application software.
Keep verifying functional requirements manually
The best
software management tools and testing practices can help you ensure a
high-level performance of the application software. None of them is capable of
ensuring if you are not missing on any functional requirements. They come into
existence during a discussion with your client. An external top-level, third
eye view is fundamental to ensure the project is in the best position to
terminate with utmost client satisfaction.
Always keep data security and user privacy in mind
GDPR compliant
and cloud security of applications is very critical matters that need your
attention right now. It is generally ignored but ensuring foolproof encryption
of the data warehouse, database-related application layers. Thick isolation of
all user profiles is extremely crucial. Digital users are becoming more and
more vigilant with time, and user privacy is not something anyone of us would
ever compromise.
Check secured gateway connections & database resources
Using SSL
certification for HTTP server and securing all gateway connections and database
resources at the native application level is extremely important. It can
quickly help you avoid the DDOS attacks and Bot-based cyber attacks that can
easily engage your software applications for procuring data. It further leads
to compromised user experience and higher-level difficult to track cyber
attacks.
Have a dynamically scalable team
It is essential
to allow a fair share of the overall software development budget to the testing
phase. It is not a wise idea to trade overall software performance against a
small cut down on the budget. Cost-effective development operations are
always desirable, and there is a foolproof way to execute.
Testing
processes generally take a varying amount of human labor and other resources to
monitor the ongoing test operations. You can keep dynamically scalable testing
teams to reduce costs when fewer people are needed. Then you may scale in case
of requirements at the time of user-based testing.
The most crucial software testing technique
The essential
software testing technique is not rocket science. Neither it is a sophisticated
tool that you may use. It is all about providing an ample amount of resources
and time for user-based testing. It is essential to perform test suites,
created a regime, and even execute scalable testing in a real-time
environment.
There is
absolutely nothing comparable to real humans who use the application in
real-time and give you feedback. The main objective is to not just improve on
the functionalities features and performance. It is to build an emotional hook
that can engage users.
How are software testing & development related?
Software
development and testing are like a complimentary chain reaction. A company
should cultivate the best software development practices. It will be
benefited with ease in testing tasks and less hard work for achieving the
desired performance metrics. Further, if a company is good with dedicated
software application testing and analysis of test reports, it will improve its next
software development project. It is imperative to learn from every phase of
every project and incorporate the learning for optimized development and
testing practices. The best software development and testing techniques let
you:
§ Optimize costs
§ Be more profitable
§ Exceed customer expectations
§ Enrich customer experience
§ Magnify business capabilities
Bottom-line
The best
software development and testing practices can help you achieve the right
numbers and may satisfy our clients to a greater extent. The ultimate crux of
success for any project lies in reading the minds of customers and redirecting
the efforts. Every feedback is an opportunity to redirect in a more effective,
better working, and highly successful application software.
Digital
transformation has undoubtedly disrupted the IT business space with flooding
projects. The best software development and testing practices can lead you to
more stabilized client accounts. They will not only lead to better business
endeavors. But also leave you with ample scope of consistent innovation and
supreme client servicing in the upcoming years
Comments
Post a Comment