Software development has changed a lot in the past few decades. Advances in technology, new programming languages and more have changed the way developers write and execute code. There are literally hundreds of such technologies. Below are the top nine advances in software development. Letterman, eat your heart out!
- World Wide Web: while the Web has nothing to do with programming, it certainly revolutionized programming – especially for small developers who use the Internet to market and sell their programs.
- Managed Code: Code that works – without hours spent searching for logic errors – languages like C# are a great example of managed code.
- Code Sharing and Google: Developers who run into a problem have an excellent resource in code sharing – it’s a built in community for help!
- Code Outlining: a handy space saver, code outlining utilizes XML based tags to organize source code neatly into hierarchies and sections that are collapsible – all the design power with none of the aggravating scrolling.
- Microsoft Windows: Love it or hate it, the huge pool of Microsoft users is a built in audience for developers that base their applications in the Microsoft environment.
- IDEs: IDEs, or Integrated Development Environments, give developers a single dashboard for all their development needs. These typically include a graphical user interface, documentation system and macro language.
- Automated Build Tools: A nifty utility program that developers utilize during the build of new versions for software applications. Build tools make development faster and more accurate.
- Faster Processors: Faster processors have made application design and development faster while improving end user performance at the same time.
- Modeling Tools: This is a complex system in which existing events and processes are documented during the development and design of application software. This information becomes an effective blueprint for future construction or re-engineering.