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Component-Based Development or CBD offers yet another approach to that of software development. Software applications are built using components, and these components can come from a number of different sources, be written in several different programming languages, etc.
History
The manufacturing industry has been using the principles component-based development for centuries. Take the car manufacturing industry for example: a car is made up of thousands of parts (or components) and these parts have come from a multitude of different places. The car engine might have been built in Germany, the tyres in France, the exhaust in the USA, the upholstery in Italy, etc... and all this assembled in a factory in the UK.
It has only been since the start of the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century though that things took off, thanks to the Victorians and their desire to Standardize everything. Standardization allowed manufacturers to create components that others could use.
Concepts
Component-Based Development is an extension to conventional software development and management. It satisfies many of the requirements of using components, but it also satisfies the requirements of other conventional techniques.
Helping to improve the business process
If a software application is assembled from components, then it should be easy to reconfigure the components to support desired changes in the business process. Business processes may be improved in three ways:
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- Simplification
- This can be achieved by using components to produce stepwise improvements.
- Integration
- Combining two or more previously unconnected processes into a larger one.
- Transformation
- Breaking down the components, and reassembling them in a new way.
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Helping to improve the software application
Various standards, in particular ISO 9126 provide various definitions of what good software should entail.
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- Functionality
- Maintainability
- Usability
- Efficiency
- Reliability
- Portability
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