In the realm of Software Development Life Cycles (SDLC), people have two broad ideas: Waterfall with its linear steps or Agile with its flexible changes. Students in HND projects need to get the right idea because it's not only about getting something done, but something useful.
Rigid vs. Adaptive
The ability to use these techniques is crucial for a Lead Developer.
Waterfall (The Linear Giant): It's a linear process: Requirements, Design, Implementation, Testing, and Maintenance. It's good for projects where safety is a concern or the project scope won't change. If a design flaw happens in Waterfall, it'll be costly during the testing phase.
Agile (The Iterative Ninja): It's good for modern applications like CRUD-based applications or e-commerce applications because the project requirements may change over time.
Professional verdict: Waterfall should be used if the project's ultimate goal is clear and static. Agile should be used if the project requires flexibility and dynamic updates.
Practical Agile Workflow
Junior developers think Agile means you just discuss your code. But for a real project, you need a workflow.
Backlog: Write each feature, like "User Login" or "SQL Database Connection," as a User Story.
Sprint: Plan a two-week period where your team focuses on completing a set of backlog items.
Visual Management: Use GitHub Projects to track your progress. Moving a task from "To-Do" to "Done" is like a professional Lead Developer setup.
Summary
When writing your project for your unit rubric, use logic as your basis. Agile is not just "quicker." Agile is a means of decreasing your risk. By using an iterative methodology, you test your MVC (Model-View-Controller) architecture early and often instead of waiting until the end of your project to have a huge failure.
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