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What is Application Lifecycle management (ALM)?

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When it comes to question of what is exactly Application Lifecycle management (ALM), different people have quite different perspectives. It is common to equate ALM with the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). However, this simple approach is far too restrictive. ALM is much more than just managing the SDLC. In fact, the life cycle of an application includes all time during which an organization is spending money on that asset, from the initial idea to the end of the life of an application. To be accurate, our point of view on application lifecycle management should adopt a broader perspective. Like a person's lifestyle, an application's lifecycle is demarcated by many events of varying significance. It starts with an idea: "Let's develop something that delivers a particular value." Once the application is designed and developed, the next big occurrence is the release, when the application goes into production. And lastly, when no more enterprise value can be realized, the application evolves to end of its lifecycle and is retired from service. ALM can be separated into three different areas: Administration, Development, and Operations.

ADMINISTRATION:

In ALM, the goal of administration is to ensure that applications are developed that meet the needs of the enterprise. The first step in ALM administration is business requirements development. This research happens before the design and coding processes take place. Once the requirements are accepted, application development begins, and administration is applied through project portfolio management. In some companies, this is simple: A supervisor might be connected to the group, or one of the more specialized people in the group might take on this position. Other businesses use more professional techniques, depending on a central project management office (PMO) to employ previously established processes. Once the application is release, it becomes part of the enterprise's application portfolio. An application is a resource like any other, and so the firm needs a continuous understanding of its costs and benefits. PPM tools usually provide this, giving organizations a way to avoid duplicating features across different programs. PPM also provides administration for deployed applications, dealing with things such as when releases and upgrades make financial sense and mitigating risk. Administration is the only thing that spans the entire ALM period. In many ways, it's the most important factor of ALM. Get it wrong, and you will not come close to extracting the maximum value from you applications.

DEVELOPMENT:

Once a business requirements are accepted, the software development lifecycle begins. Agile SLDC's will use a series of iterations or sprints while a traditional SDLC would be one long waterfall process. In the case of iterations or sprints, each is executed with a set of requirements (expressed as user stories or use cases), various designs, code, and test procedures. This repetitive style of development is not always appropriate—some applications are still better developed using more traditional methods—but agile and hybrid practices are quickly becoming the standard. Regardless of the model used, once the SDLC procedure for the first edition of an application is completed, the application is release. For most applications though, release does not mean the end of an application's lifecycle. Instead, the application needs intermittent updates and perhaps even one or more full software development cycles to create and implement new designs. For some applications, the investment of capital on these updates trumps the cost of developing the original application. Be sure to note the significance of the SDLC to the overall ALM procedure. Although this facet is certainly important, it's far from the whole tale. Thinking of ALM as equal to a SDLC is just plain wrong and can result in a severe misunderstanding of the factors needed to successfully manage the lifecycle of an application.

OPERATIONS:

Every released application must be managed and maintained. As with Administration, Operations practices are intimately connected with development. For example, organizing for a release likely takes place shortly before the application is finished, and the act of release itself is a basic part of operations. Once the application is release, it must be maintained throughout its lifecycle. Also, each revision to the application must be properly release once its ready. As you can see, ALM is much more than just creating code. All three aspects—administration, development, and operations—are critical. consider an application where the initial administration procedures are incorrect, for example, perhaps the business requirements are not properly understood or the right stakeholders are not engaged. no matter how well teams execute the development and operations processes, the application will not offer much value to the enterprise. Similarly, a team that focuses on the right issues using first-class development procedures might overlook operational difficulties, such as offering enough resources to run the application stably. Once again, the value realized by the enterprise from this application will not be as large as it should be. Understanding the full scope of ALM can help businesses steer clear of difficulties like these. Maximizing the value of the applications we make requires implementing all three factors of ALM well. Accomplishing this objective is not easy, especially when most of today's ALM tools are not as well built and integrated as they should be. Yet there is no way around it: Incorporating a full, holistic view of ALM is critical for increasing the value output of an enterprise. Check out TechExcel's integrated ALM tools.

The post What is Application Lifecycle management (ALM)? appeared first on TechExcel.


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