Application and software development

What is the development software?

As its name implies, a development software is a program that allows the development of applications, some of these are java, visual basic, c ++, etc. Development software is commonly referred to as IDE (Integrated Development Environment).

What is an application developer?

Computer application programmers develop, create and modify computer applications from general software or specialized utility programs; analyze user needs and develop software solutions, design or customize software for customer use with the aim of optimizing operational efficiency; They can analyze and design the databases within an application area, working individually or coordinating the development of the database as part of a team.

Computer application programmer tasks

• Develop a software application specifically for individual users.
  
• Consult with users about software system design and maintenance.
  
• Meet with systems analysts, engineers, programmers, and others to design the system and gain insight into project capabilities and limitations, execution needs, and interfaces.
  
• Analyze user needs and software requirements to determine the feasibility of the design within time and cost limits.
  
• Modify, adapt, extend and integrate existing software solutions including standard software.
  
• Test and implement developed programs.
  
• Improve the software application in relation to functionality, security and economic feasibility.
  
• Produce program documentation, such as step-by-step guides.
  
• Guide, train and train users.

Related occupations software

• IT information analyst
  
• Computer systems analyst
  
• Computer software checker
  
• IT consultant
  
• IT department manager
  
• Computer software engineer
  
• IT Project Manager
  
• Other analysts or developers of software or multimedia teams
  
• Professional seller of computer products

Software development kit

A software development kit (in English, software development kit or SDK) is generally a set of software development tools that allows a software developer to create a computer application for a specific system, for example certain software packages, environments workstations, hardware platforms, computers, game consoles, operating systems, and so on.

It is something as simple as an application programming interface (API) created to allow the use of a certain programming language, or it can also include sophisticated hardware to communicate with a certain embedded system. The most common software development tools include support for detecting programming errors such as an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and other utilities. The SDKs often also include sample code and supporting technical notes or other supporting documentation to help clarify certain points in the primary reference material.

Incompatibility of licenses

SDKs may include software licenses that make them incompatible to create software that is intended to be licensed unsupported. For example: a proprietary SDK will probably be incompatible for free software development. And an SDK under the GPL license will possibly be incompatible with proprietary software development. However, those under the LGPL are generally safe for proprietary software development.

SDK for plugins

An SDK for a certain operating system add-on (eg QuickTime for Mac OS) may also include the add-on software itself to be used for development but not necessarily for redistribution. An interesting situation arises here between platforms where it is possible to develop applications that can start the configuration of a system without the plug-in being installed, and use a Gestalt-type environment request routine (from Mac OS) to determine if said plug-in is installed. , and others where the application will simply fail to start. In other words, it is possible to build a single binary that works in configurations where the plugin is present or not, with reduced functionality in the latter case.

Physical components

Although most SDKs consist exclusively of text (programs, their licenses, instructions, etc.), on certain occasions they have also included hardware, especially when it is not widely distributed. The first SDK for Near Field Communications (NFC), and which was published by AirTag in 2008, for example, included the two halves that are physically necessary for transmitting and receiving.

More specific terms

SDK providers for certain systems or subsystems may use a more specific term than "software". For example, both Microsoft and Apple provide driver development kits (DDKs) to create drivers for their devices, and PalmSource distributes its own development kit as the Palm OS Development Kit (PDK).

Examples

• Microsoft's Virtual Earth SDK.
• Microsoft's DirectX SDK, on which, for example, most current Windows games are based.Microsoft's .
• Net Framework, on which many forms-based applications are based.
• The Sun Microsystems' Java SDK.
• The Widgets Toolkits, on which many utilities developed with object-oriented programming languages are based.
• Turbo Pascal.
• Clipper.
• Delphi.
• The Source SDK, a tool designed by Valve in which you can design mods and maps for Source engine games. Available on Steam when purchasing a game that uses the Source engine.
• The Android SDK, developed by Google for its namesake system.
• The Ubuntu SDK.

Application programming interface

The application programming interface, also known by the acronym API, application programming interface, is a set of subroutines, functions and procedures (or methods, in object-oriented programming) that offers a certain library to be used by another software as an abstraction layer. They are generally used in programming libraries.

Features

An API represents the ability to communicate between software components. It is the set of calls to certain libraries that offer access to certain services from the processes and represents a method to achieve abstraction in programming, generally (although not necessarily) between the lower and upper levels or layers of the software. One of the main purposes of an API is to provide a set of general-purpose functions, for example, to draw windows or icons on the screen. In this way, programmers benefit from the advantages of the API by making use of its functionality, avoiding the work of programming everything from scratch. APIs are also abstract: the software that provides a certain API is generally called the implementation of that API.

For example, you can see the task of writing "Hello World" on the screen at different levels of abstraction:

1. Doing all the work from scratch:
   1. Trace, on graph paper, the shape of the letters (and space) "H, o, l, a, M, u, n, d, o".
   2. Create an array of black and white squares that resembles the sequence of letters.
   3. Using assembly instructions, write the array information to the screen buffer.
   4. Using the appropriate instruction, have the graphics card dump that information onto the screen.
2. Through an operating system to do part of the work:
   1. Loads a font provided by the operating system.
   2. Have the operating system clear the screen.
   3. Have the operating system draw the text "Hello World" using the loaded font.
3. Using an application (which in turn uses the operating system) to do most of the work:
   1. Write an HTML document with the words "Hello World" so that a web browser such as Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari, Midori, Iceweasel, Web, or Microsoft Edge can render it on the monitor.

As you can see, the first option requires more steps, each of which is much more complicated than the steps for the subsequent options. Furthermore, it is impractical to use the first approach to represent a large amount of information, such as an encyclopedic article on the screen, while the second approach simplifies the task by eliminating one step and making the rest simpler and the third form simply requires writing "Hello World". However, high-level APIs generally lose flexibility; for example, it is much more difficult in a web browser to rotate text around a point with a blinking outline than to program it at a low level. Choosing to use an API must strike a balance between its power, simplicity, and loss of flexibility.

Examples of programming interfaces

• CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture)
  
• Drupal API
  
• Glibc
  
• Microsoft Win32 API
  
• Microsoft WMI
  
• ASPI, software interface to assist SCSI bus devices
  
• The Carbon APIs for the Apple Macintosh Mac OS X
  
• Symfony for PHP
  
• Directx
  
• OpenGL

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