Waterfall Model
I will be explaining a little more in-depth of how the Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) operates. The SDLC process is a Systems Development Methodology (SDM) “which is basically the process most businesses go through to develop and maintain an Information System.” (Ross A. Malaga, (2005) Information Systems Technology, Published by Prentice Hall. Page 285. Copyright 2005 Pearson Education) The SDLC contains seven major phases; I am going to start on the first which is, Planning. Planning is the step taken to find out if the current system can be updated or if there needs to be a new system created. To help make that decision four feasibility analyses will need to be completed, technical, economic, operational, and schedule. The technical analysis will determine what technologies are present and what can be created to solve the aroused issue. The economic analysis will find out if the company can afford the new or upgraded Information System (IS) and if it will benefit the company at all. The operational analysis will determine the reaction that humans will have with this new system. (Likes, Dislikes, and Employee Cooperation) The schedule analysis will determine whether or not the proposed completion time is realistic. All these steps must be completed in order to move on to the next step. The second step of the SDLC is System Analysis. The System Analysis step is where the systems analyst in the IT development team determines the exact problems then details an exact IS solution to the problem as well as a to-do list for future reference in the SDLC. This step must be completed after the planning and before moving on, to ensure quality in the product being designed. The third step of the SDLC is Systems Design. Once the Systems Development Team understands the requirements needed in order to solve the issues at hand the systems design phase can start. The Systems Design phase is meant to describe how the Systems Development team will create this new system.