It’s an exciting time to be part of software development.
By the time 2023 comes to a close, revenue in the software market is projected to have reached $659 billion — which is huge.
Of course, because technology is always advancing, new software development trends keep popping up. Some are genuinely valuable, while other trends are worth forgetting about. This guide is here to tell you about the trends that matter and can transform your business for the better, from the development of your products to improving the end-user experience. As you navigate through these evolving trends, it's vital to keep in mind that custom software often holds an edge over ready-made solutions. While ready solutions might seem convenient, investing in custom software can lead to long-term benefits, driving innovation and setting your business apart in a competitive market.
Now, let’s begin with the first trend and work down from there.
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Database Source Control
The first and most important trend is database source control. Essentially, it’s the same as application version control, except you’re keeping track of all the data infrastructure instead. This way, developers have amazing visibility and control of what’s happened to the database, its current progress, and other factors. By having all of the database changes available to see at any time, it allows bugs and problems to be fixed very quickly.
Moving into the future, database source control is going to be a huge part of software development. For a long time, developers have been leaving databases out of the CI/CD pipeline, opting to manage them on a separate basis instead. However, this is starting to change, which is great for overall software development. Database source control is a cornerstone of database DevOps, which supercharges the software development life cycle by eliminating database change bottlenecks.
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No-Code Development
Another exciting trend in software development is no-code development.
In a nutshell, no-code development allows business employees who aren’t programmers to create software using something called a graphical user interface. Naturally, this makes the software development process fast, easy, and incredibly efficient.
So, what are the most popular no-code development apps? The good news is that there are lots to choose from. It’s impossible to tell you about them all, but here are some of the current crowd favorites:
- Microsoft Power Apps
- Appy Pie
- Glide
Remember, users need to have no experience with coding to use these apps, meaning they have the perfect platform to build applications without having to undergo training.
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Artificial Intelligence
AI is slowly starting to take over the world.
Although this is a scary prospect for many, it’s great news for people in the software development world (as well as the customers themselves), as it ultimately means that better applications can be made.
When it comes to the actual uses of AI in software development, there are several. For example, AI can be used for debugging, code reviews, and other time-consuming tasks that previously had to be done manually by human developers.
Over the coming decades, most industry experts expect that AI will largely drive software development. There will still be human input, but AI will be the focal point.
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Strong Cybersecurity
Strong cybersecurity has fast become one of the biggest trends in software development.
While developing new apps and products, businesses must ensure that they have cybersecurity measures to protect themselves from potential cyberattacks. For example, if a company is developing an app, the last thing it needs is for a cybercriminal group to destroy everything they’ve developed while stealing valuable data.
Now, firewalls are no longer just enough. In order to be fully protected, you’re now starting to see security apps like VIPRE be deployed by companies to keep their software projects secure from outside forces. In addition to this, developers are also using stronger passwords, two-factor authentication, and other smaller cybersecurity measures for added protection.
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Early User Feedback
In the past, companies would make the fatal mistake of not getting feedback on their apps until the very end of the development process. By then, it would be too costly or time-consuming to make big changes, which effectively rendered the feedback useless.
The solution that developers now use is this: early user feedback. What this involves is test users coming in early to try out the application and give valuable feedback regarding features and everything else in between. This feedback is invaluable, as it allows changes to be made way ahead of time before it’s too late.
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DevOps
DevOps is a relatively new and innovative approach in software development.
In case you didn’t know already, it’s an approach that focuses exclusively on collaboration and communication between software developers and IT leaders. It effectively stops messages from getting lost in translation, which in turn leads to fewer bugs and errors in the software. Also, the end product can be delivered to the customers much faster because of how much time was saved during the software development process, which is a huge added bonus.
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Blockchain
Blockchain is something that’s traditionally associated with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. However, it’s now slowly becoming a big part of software development, which businesses should be extremely excited about. Why? Because it allows developers to track codebases much more easily. Plus, it’s also great for creating trustless systems, which is good for increasing the speed of software development.
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Outsourcing
It’s no secret that outsourcing has started to play a significant role in most industries — including software development.
Now, companies can use third-party organizations to receive custom software solutions. For example, you might do this if you don’t have any in-house employees who are capable of completing a specific development task.
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Remote Developers
A decade ago, almost all software engineers worked in-house. Fast forward to today, and everything has changed.
According to DevOps.com, 83% of software developers now work remotely more than half of the time. This might seem a little unbelievable, but it makes perfect sense. After all, software development is something that can be easily done from home. Plus, it’s super easy for development teams to stay in contact with each other through cloud communication platforms like Microsoft Teams.
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Mixed Reality
Finally, the tenth and final software development trend is mixed reality.
Modern customers are now accessing a lot of applications using VR (Virtual Reality) headsets. This is only possible because of developers using a mixed reality approach, where they are able to create and test software products before they reach the customer.
