AS/A level Computer Science - Chapter 12 – Software Development

Learning Objectives:

12.1 Program Development Life cycle
Show understanding of the purpose of a development life cycle
Show understanding of the need for different development life cycles depending on the program being developed (Including, waterfall, iterative, rapid application development (RAD)
Describe the principles, benefits and drawbacks of each type of life cycle
Show understanding of the analysis, design, coding, testing and maintenance stages in the program development life cycle.

12.2 Program Design
Use a structure chart to decompose a problem into sub-tasks and express the parameters passed between the various modules / procedures / functions which are part of the algorithm design
Describe the purpose of a structure chart
Construct a structure chart for a given problem
Derive equivalent pseudocode from a structure chart.
Show understanding of the purpose of state-transition diagrams to document an algorithm.

12.3 Program Testing and maintenance
Show understanding of ways of exposing and avoiding faults in programs.
Locate and identify the different types of errors:
syntax errors
logic errors
run-time errors
Correct identified errors
Show understanding of the methods of testing available and select appropriate data for a given method (Including dry run, walkthrough, white-box, black-box, integration, alpha, beta, acceptance, stub)
Show understanding of the need for a test strategy and test plan and their likely contents.
Choose appropriate test data for a test plan (Including normal, abnormal and extreme/boundary)
Show understanding of the need for continuing maintenance of a system and the differences between each type of maintenance (Including perfective, adaptive, corrective)
Analyze an existing program and make amendments to enhance functionality