Software Production & 9 categories of software

 

   

                        In this blog, I will try to share with the things comprise in software production. Software production may relate to the software development life cycle process. And the 9  categories of software platform

     

Analysis -  this is the process of a detailed analysis of the project in which the team will identify the necessary requirement to make the project's feasibility in order to meet customer expectations. This also comprises of what programming language will be used to utilize the performance and cost of the project.

Design - after detailed analysis, designing the project takes over. The team basically establishes standards in order to minimize the flaws, efficiency, and user-friendly design in building the architecture of the system.

Development - project developers start to construct the necessary components and functionalities of the system. This also engages the software development process that will guide the construction of the system. 

Testing  - This basically tests the initial result of the development to find bugs and errors in the system

Implementation - this is the crucial part because the developed system will be evaluated by the stakeholders to make sure the system reaches the level of satisfaction of the users.

Maintenance - When all the stages were successfully passed. The maintenance process will take over to ensure the system is bug-free and upgrades will receive by the end-user to adapt the changes. 

                                                         Categories of Software

    

Technology Platforms  

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Twilio are examples of Technology Platforms. Technology Platforms provide building blocks or services that are reused in a large number of products. Through permission-less innovation 3rd party developers embed these building blocks and services in their products, driving more adoption of the platform.

Computing Platforms 

Computing Platforms, in stark contrast with Technology Platforms, enable interactions between platform users and 3rd party developers. In Technology Platforms the developer “owns” the user. In Computing Platforms, the platform “owns” the user. Computing Platforms, like Apple iOS, Google Android or Microsoft Windows, allow developers extend the platform with new use cases, making the platform more valuable to users.

Utility Platforms

Google Search, Kayak and Zenefits are examples of Utility Platforms. Utility Platforms attract users by providing a useful, typically free service. Once there is critical mass of users using the service, the platform opens to the second type of participants, advertisers in the case of Google Search, airlines in the case of Kayak or insurance companies in the case of Zenefits.

Interaction Networks

Facebook, WeChat and Bitcoin are examples of Interaction Networks. The common element is that this type of platform facilitates interactions between specific participants (people and/or businesses). The digital interactions can take form of a message, voice call, image, or money transfer.

Marketplaces

Marketplaces like eBay, Amazon Marketplace, AirBnB, Kickstarter or UpWork are two-sided platforms connecting supply with demand. Marketplaces enable transactions between demand-side participants (buyers) and supply-side participants (sellers). Prices of goods and services offered on the platform are set by the supply-side participants. Not less important, there is high sensitivity for variety of services/products — generally, the more variety offered on the platform, the better.

On-demand Service Platforms

Uber, Munchery and Heal are examples of On-demand Service Platforms. This type of platform is designed to deliver end-to-end services fulfilled by a network of independent service providers/contractors. Its tradeoffs are very different from those of Marketplaces.

Content Crowdsourcing Platforms

YouTube, Yelp and TripAdvisor are examples of Content Crowdsourcing Platforms. This platform type is about collecting content from a subset of users (video, blog posts, reviews, ratings, etc.) and sharing this content with a wide user base of the platform.

Data Harvesting Platforms

Waze, OpenSignal and InsideSales.com are examples of Data Harvesting Platforms. Such platforms offer a useful service to the users and generate data through usage of the platform service. In fact, the agreement to contribute data is a requirement to join the platform. The data collected from all users of the platform is fed back to the service making it more useful for users.

Content Distribution Platforms

Google AdSense, Outbrain, Smaato and Millennial Media are examples of Content Distribution Platforms. Such platforms connect owners of user touch-points (web sites, mobile apps, devices) with content owners wishing to deliver the content (or ads) to the users.