Software development legal checklist

5 Nov 2023

Guidance note

This page gives a simple overview of the ‘waterfall’ software development process and highlights some key legal and commercial issues that should be included in a properly drafted Software Development Agreement. Not addressing these properly from the outset can have serious consequences both legally and commercially.

Irfan Baluch

Partner
Commercial

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1. Business need

Identify the business need

2. Perform requirements analysis

Evaluate:

Existing infrastructure
Interfacing with other systems
Mission critical/real time systems
End-user requirements
Desired functionality
Performance criteria
Regulatory/audit criteria
Consider proposed revenue model if appropriate

3. Define functional specification

Development language and tools
Interfacing with other applications
Future proofing
Performance
Scalability
Security
Functional operation
Maintainability
User interface (Beware of scope creep)

4. Design and development phase

Technical specification
System/program architecture
Well documented code
Version control
Quality assurance
Error reporting
User interface

5. Developer testing

Functionality
Destructive testing
Review output and reporting

You may have to go back to stage 4 once developer testing has been done.

6. User/acceptance testing

Has the functional specification been achieved?
Benchmark the performance
What happens when you Go Live?

7. Implementation and deployment

Training
Transition
Data migration
User documentation
Configuration documentation

8. Maintenance

Refining the software
Support and maintenance agreements
Service levels
Identify future development to meet evolving business needs

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