This section would be a good kick start for fresher’s who want to pursue their career in software development or testing fields. I have detailed each and every phase of the Software Development Life Cycle.This explanation is based on the methodologies which was followed in a company i was working for.

The Software Development Life Cycle consists of six phases. The phases are as listed below
a.  Initial Phase
b.  Analysis Phase
c.  Design Phase
d.  Coding Phase
e.  Testing Phase
f.  Delivery and Maintenance Phase

Initial Phase:
I would consider the “Initial Phase” as the most important phase of software development life cycle. This is the phase where the company interacts with the customer to gather the customer requirements.Only if the requirements are clear the company can go ahead to develop a quality product which is 100% defect free. Quality doesn’t simply mean satisfying the requirements of the customer. It also means user friendliness. User friendliness always adds value to the product. That is why we call this phase as the important phase of Software Development Life Cycle.The Business Analyst is always responsible for gathering the requirements from the customer.The Business Analyst and the Manager should coordinate in order to understand the requirements clearly. If the requirements are not clear then they demonstrate a prototype in order to gather the clear requirements from the customer.  

At the end of the Initial Phase we get the Functional Requirements Specification (FRS). It is also called as Business Requirements Specification (BRS). In my company it is called as FRS.

Analysis Phase:
In this phase the software engineers analyze the requirements in detail. They will carry out a detailed study of the requirements in order to check the requirements are really viable or not. The technologies that are required to complete the project successfully are listed out. This includes analyzing about the platform, the front end tools (GUI), the back end tools (database used to store data), the type of environment on which the product is going to be deployed (stand alone, client-server, distributed or web). The major factors such as the project size, the number of programmers required, the complexity involved, the cost of training the resources, availability of technically skilled resources, the software and the hardware the company should procure everything would be analyzed in detail.

At the end of this phase we get the System Requirements Specification (SRS).

Design Phase:
Software design should suggest an approach for the implementation of the product. The Chief Architect and the Technical Lead will design the architecture for the software product. They will divide the whole project in to number of modules using the Unified Modeling Language (UML). This is called the High Level Design (HLD).

The Architectural design also involves decomposing the high level functions in to sub functions and establishing interconnections between modules ( among functions, data structures and data storage).This is called the Low Level Design (LLD). The Technical Lead will also develop some Pseudo Code. (Set of simple instructions. This will be really helpful for programmers when they develop the actual code)

 The outcome document of this phase is the Technical Design Document (TDD).

Coding Phase:
Now we have the objective of translating the detailed design specification of software in to a form that is acceptable by the computer. Now it is time to select a programming language that gives good shape to our design specification. The programming language opted for should have good coding efficiency and should have features like data abstraction and object oriented approach.The software programmers will develop the actual code with the help of pseudo code. It is always good to follow standard coding styles. It differs from company to company.

The completed source code for all modules is the outcome of this phase. The corresponding executable and the proper documentation for the modules are also made ready.


Testing Phase:
Testing is defined as a process of verification and validation. It is a key element of software quality assurance. The requirements, design and coding needs to be reviewed. Here comes the role of test engineers. The test engineers will first review the requirements document for understanding the requirements clearly. Once the test engineer is clear with the requirements he will write the test cases such that it meets the testing objectives. The engineer writes series of test cases that are intended to find bugs.

Once the build is released by the development team the test engineer will execute the series of test cases on the build. If any defects are identified he will consolidate it in a document and escalate it to the development team for correction. The process continues till the product is defect free.

Delivery and Maintenance Phase:
The deployment engineer will go the customer site to install the product/software in the client environment. He will make use of the deployment document handed over to him by the development team. He would be responsible for making the software up and running.

Maintenance is the phase that follows the delivery of the product to the client. Maintenance activities involve making changes in user display, upgrading the performance, introducing enhancements, improving documentation, hardware up gradation, adapting the product to new environments and also most importantly the error correction.

The full form of SQL is structured query language. The SQL is a standard language for the accessing and manipulating the database. This is a language of ANSI (American national standard institute) standard one. By using this language we can execute queries against the database. We can retrieve data from the database, we insert records in a database, we can delete records from the database, we can update records from the database, we can create new database, we can create store procedures in the database, and we can set up permissions on tables, procedures and views.

The basic concept needed for SQL is RDBMS (Relational Database Management System) and even for all the database systems. RDBMS data is stored in Table form where a Table is a collection of records. Record is a collection of Rows and Columns. Most of the database tables contain 1 or more tables. Every table is identified with it specific name. The actions performed on the database are done by sql statement that is nothing but queries.

Structured query language is a case sensitive. Some database language query should be ended with the semicolon. But for SQL server2000 and MS access doesn’t need semicolon at the end of the query.

Structured query language (SQL) has classified into 2 parts:

1.Datamanupulation Language(DML)

2.Data Definition Language(DDL)

 1. Datamanupulation Language(DML) commands for writing a query:

 a. Select command –

          Select command is used to extract selected data from the database.

b.Update command-

         Update command is used to update the data in the database.

c.Delete command –

         Delete command is used to Delete the data in the database.

d.Insert command –

         Insert command is used to insert new data in the database.

2. Data definition Language (DDL):

 In SQL, DDL commands permits the database to create and update the tables. The DDL commands are:

 a. Create Database command –

           This command is used to create a new database.

b. Alter Database command –

           This command is used to modify database.

c. Create Table command –

           This command is used to create a new table.

 d. Alter Table command –

           This command is used to modify tables.

e.  Drop table command –

          This command is used to delete Table.

f. Drop index command –

           This command is used to delete an index.

Statements:

1. The select statements:

         The data from the database can be selected by using select statement of sql. This result of the sql statement will be stored in result- set.

Syntax:

Select column_name from table_name

Or

Select * from table_name

2.       Select distinct statement:

A table may contain duplicate values in the column. We can list only distinct values by using select distint statement.

Syntax:

Select Distinct colum_nname from table_name

3.   Select where clause:

To extract particular data from the table we can use where clause.

Syntax:

Select column_name from table_name where column_name operator value.

The operators allowed in the where clause :

1. = equal

2. >< Not equal

3. > Greater than

4. < Less than

5.   >=greater than or equal

6. <= Less than or equal

7. BETWEEN – Between an inclusive range.

8. LIKE – to Search for the pattern

9. IN – to return the exact value for a column.

4.  And & or operator:

The records can be filtered using a condition by using And & or operator. If first condition and the second condition is true, then the And operator displays the record. If the first condition or the second condition is true then the Or operator displays the record.

Syntax:

Select * from table_name where column_name= value And Column_name= Value

5. Orderby Clause:

OrderBy clause is used to sort the result set. We can sort the record by using orderby clause command. We can sort the record in ascending order and descending order. The default of sorting the record is ascending order.

Syntax:

Select column_name from table_name orderby column_name Asc|Dec

6.Insert inti statement:

To insert new record into the table Insert Into command is used. There are two forms of insert into command.

To insert only values

Syntax:

Insert into Table_Name Values (value1, value2, value3……………..)

To insert both columns and values

Syntax:

Insert into table_name( column1, column2, column3……………..) values(value1,value2,value3………)

7.Update statement:

To update the existing records in a table we can use update statement.

Syntax:

Update table_name SET column1 = value, column2= value...where some_column = some_value

If the where clause is omitted then all the columns in the records gets updated.

8.Delete statement:

To delete record in the table, we can use delete statement.

Syntax:

Delete from table_name where some _column= some_value

A beautiful design. That is what the Mac systems from Apple, but the operating system called osx that will come standard with the Mac systems may not support the applications you use. They also want a full-fledged operating system more advanced than OSX.

Thanks to the Intel-based CPU `s currently in the Mac systems are placed, it is possible to easily install Windows on your Mac. Previously available systems, the Mac does not have a CPU that supports standard Windows was. Through some tricks it was possible to run Windows on these systems to install everything there was a lack of good drivers.

BootCamp assistant
Besides the fact that the Intel-based Mac systems, Apple has made it possible to install Windows using Boot Camp Assistant. Apparently they want to design a quality operating system that supports all, and therefore Apple will come with this tool is that it is possible to install Windows on the Mac.

Installing Windows 7
Installing Windows 7 is as easy as starting up your Mac system. To install Windows 7 is a disk that Windows 7 is an original license (or a trial version). To insert the disk into your Mac system, Windows 7 and wait until the disc geladen.Vervolgens go to the folder `s and then followed by a sub folder` s Tool This last folder is the Boot Camp Assistant utility. Double-click this tool and will launch the program.

BootCamp Assistant has a clear step by step setup you can go through. BootCamp assistant will ask you how large you want the partition where you want to install Windows 7. I recommend you to at least half of the hard disk if you want to use Windows 7.

If the setup has completed, restart the Mac, and then begin installing Windows 7. You get back a setup window that certain things are required. It is also possible here to format the partition, you must do this. Windows 7 will not ask but working to get Windows 7, you must first format the Windows partition 7.

Then you can simply run the setup, and Windows 7 will begin the installation process. It takes about half hour to three quarters. The Mac will reboot a few times, this is all part of the process of installation.

When the desktop Windows 7, you have to do one thing before you can use Windows on your Mac 7. The correct drivers are not installed by Windows 7, therefore you need to drive in Snow Leopard throw and go through the installation of this disc. This ensures that all features of Mac operating systems such as the keyboard but also the sound and the webcam will work on your Mac.

After installing all kinds of functions on your Mac as it should work, you can now update your Windows 7 and install your applications.

Standard Windows 7 launch
After installation, Windows 7 is set as the default operating system on your Mac. This means that if your Mac will automatically start Windows 7 starts. If you really want to get OSX and default operating system starts you can feel it afterwards as well. You do this by booting from the Mac the option key and hold, this is the left alt key on the keyboard. Now there are two disks appear where you can select. One, Windows 7 and the other OSX, click the drive with OSX on it and the old operating system will boot.
You have not yet OSX and operating system are standard, a tool that lets you setup in the Utilities folder `s.

Other operating systems
It is with Boot Camp assisant possible to install older versions of Windows including XP and Vista. It is also possible to install Linux or Ubuntu using Boot Camp assisant.

UNIX

Most Computer users have a very little concept about Operating Systems. Let us make some light upon a very different Operating system called UNIX. It is much more than the MSDOS. Talking about its history, it was built at the AT&T Laboratories in late 1960s. A design was made by Rudd Canady and later this design was improved to UNIX by Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie.  Its earlier name was UNICS or Uni-plexed Information and Computing System that finally changed into UNIX. It is written in C language. There were many reasons for the popularity of UNIX. Different commands were there for performing different tasks. More than one command can be connected to perform tasks simultaneously. The system provides pattern-matching feature. One cannot use just file name for pattern matching but also can provide expressions. The wild card characters i.e., “*” and “?” can be used for this. UNIX system treats all file alike. Files can contain anything i.e., text, directory structures etc. the system is portable. Unlike MSDOS, UNIX can be provided to different clients through server. This implies that UNIX is a multi-user system i.e., it can be used simultaneously at more than one system. It is also multi-tasking, i.e., an user can run more than one task process simultaneously. UNIX provides online help facility with a command. This displays name with syntax of specified command.

Alongwith these merits, there are some demerits too with UNIX. As there are different commands to perform different tasks, it makes the list of commands lengthy and difficult to remember each command, about its use and syntax. Of all the commands can be combined with each other. UNIX was designed for programmers but not for any end-user. Only the persons knowing the commands can work on it. It does not provide user-friendly environment as it is offered in today’s Operating Systems like Windows.

Beside all this, UNIX has very strong security system i.e., only the registered users can use the system. The user is provided with login ID and password. So, there is no chance of changing the documents by any user.