Program Development Life Cycle (PDLC)

The Program Development Life Cycle (PDLC) is a process used in software engineering to manage the development of software programs. The PDLC is similar to the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), but is applied at a higher level, to manage the development of multiple software programs or projects. When we want to develop a program by using any programming language, we have to follow a sequence of steps. These steps are called phases in program development. The program development life cycle is a set of steps or phases which are used to develop a program in any programming language.

Phases/Step of program development

Program development life cycle contains 6 Step which are as listed below

1. Problem Analysis
2. Program Designing
3. Coding
4. Testing & Debugging
5. Documentation
6. Maintenance

1. Problem Analysis

This is the first step in computer solving problem. Before writing a program one must have a proper understanding of the problem statement and decide the boundaries of the problem. In this phase, we need to understand what is the problem statement, what is our requirement and what is the output of the problem for solution. 

2. Program Designing

In this step design the blueprint of the problem. In this step algorithm and flowchart is design. This step is before coding. This step is easier and faster than coding process. It is very important phase for the program development. We write the solution in step-by-step statements.

3. Coding

In this step of Program development life cycle (PDLC) we use a programming language to write or implement the actual programming instructions for the steps defined in the previous phase. We construct the actual program in this phase. We write the program to solve the given problem by using the programming languages like C, C++, Java, etc.

4. Testing & Debugging

In this phase, we check whether the written code in the previous step is solving the specified problem or not. This means, we try to test the program whether it is solving the problem for various input data values or not. We also test if it is providing the desired output or not.

5. Documentation 

This process is help to new programmer to understand the program. The Documentation is very important step of Program development life cycle (PDLC).

6. Maintenance

In this phase, we make the enhancements. Therefore, the solution is used by the end-user. If the user gets any problem or wants any enhancement, then we need to repeat all these phases from the starting, so that the encountered problem is solved or enhancement is added.