How To Build Software From Scratch: Complete Guide + Tips

 

How to Develop Software From Scratch: Key Takeaways

• Software solutions are holistic problem-solvers within your company, while an existing product may just be a bandaid.
• Custom software complements your key differentiators by letting you offer unique features that your competitors don't have — one of custom software's biggest advantages.
• Traditional coding requires lots of legacy software tools and large development teams — but no-code app development relieves much of that burden while saving time and money.
• The project management methodology you choose matters more than you think.
• Solidifying scope and anticipating challenges upfront will save you time, money, and frustration when building software from scratch.

Software Solution vs. Software Product

Is there a difference between a software product and a software solution? While they're closely related, there is a difference:

• Software Product: A pre-built piece of software designed for a specific task or small number of tasks in a wide variety of businesses and industries.
• Software Solution: A customizable software system designed to integrate seamlessly into your tech stack and solve a specific challenge unique to your business.

In other words, an out-of-the-box product may allow you to complete a task, but a custom solution offers personalized ways to improve the way you do business.

And when it comes to your customers, providing them with a unique experience instead of generic features is an incredible way to use custom software to stand out in your market.

Don't get boxed in to out-of-the-box products. For larger business challenges, you have to think outside of the box!

Organizations often turn to developing software solutions because software products haven't solved their biggest challenges. Yet, while the benefits of custom software solutions are numerous, the cost can be prohibitive.

When you eschew programming languages and start coding without code (using no-code tools), custom software solutions become much more efficient and affordable. More on this later!

Cost of Building a Software Application From Scratch

Every software development cost estimate will vary widely. Variations in scope, complexity, and service provider rates all influence this. So when calculating ROI, it can be helpful to approach cost from the perspective of business size and user scale:

• Small businesses with fairly limited scope and complexity can expect to pay $50k+ for a fully custom, traditionally coded application built using programming languages.
• On the other hand, enterprise software with incredibly large scope and complexity could require $1M+.

So if cost is one of the major factors influencing your project, look for low-code and no-code software development agencies.

Why?

With traditional coded software from scratch, you're paying for team members who primarily manage servers and oversee complex deployments. This adds both cost and time to your project.

Do you want to spend money on a team managing servers — or actively building your software application?

But with no-code tools, all of that is abstracted away from your team — speeding up development and saving you money. In fact, low-code platforms can reduce development time and cost by 50-90% compared to traditional coding (Redhat).

With tools like Xano, backend setup is a breeze. And database management has never been easier (see our What is Airtable post for more).

You'll also see more user-friendly interfaces thanks to the relative ease of features like drag-and-drop interfaces and other pre-built components.

Let's take a closer look at how you save money with a no-code software development team, compared to traditional coding.

Building Your Software Development Team

Developing software can't happen without your core software development team!

But the scope and size of these teams varies considerably. It mostly depends on whether you're coding from scratch with a programming language (or languages!) vs. a low-code or no-code solution.

A) Traditional Coding: Outsourced or In-House Software Development Team

When coding with a popular language or multiple programming languages, a successful software development team can get pretty robust.

• ‍Business Analysts are the client experts responsible for determining the scope of the software and gathering requirements. They also answer questions for the development team.‍
• Architects help select the tech stack (every software platform and tool used in software development) for the project. They also orchestrate tech integration, database design, interfaces, and more. ‍
• Project Managers are responsible for creating the development process plan, selecting workflow methodology, and choosing the best project management tool. They manage the timeline and milestones internally, and sometimes with clients.

Project managers orchestrate and run the software creation roadmap. Sticky notes are a common way to initially map things out, supported by robust PM software.

• ‍UI and UX Designer(s) are essential for building software. That's because user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design ensures an intuitive and seamless experience (UX) with a visually appealing look and feel (UI).‍
• The role of DevOps Engineer exists to manage servers, select software monitoring tools for the project and production environment, and develop continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines.‍
• Quality Assurance Engineers are essential throughout iterative builds, integration tests, and redeployment. Through test cases, bug reports, and moroe, they ensure everything works and appears as it should across each operating system and environment.
• ‍Back-End Developer(s) create the data processing power for a software project by writing server-side code. They work closely with the project database, integrations, and API. They're essential for fixing bugs on the back-end during quality assurance testing, too.‍
• Front-End Developer(s) create what end users see when using the app, building upon the work of the UX and UI designers. The front-end developer may write their own code or use existing templates or tools, and during quality assurance, you can find them fixing bugs on the front-end.

Developers on traditional software projects spend lots of time creating, navigating, monitoring, refining, and bug-bashing code.

B) Low- and No-Code Software Development Team

That traditional development team was pretty enormous, right? With low- and no-code platforms as the foundation for your software development project, the team shrinks considerably — improving efficiency and reducing costs.

Here's what you can expect:

• ‍Project Managers are responsible for building the project plan and workflow. On a no-code development team, a project manager also typically takes on the role of Business Analyst and Quality Assurance Engineer because they don't need to understand code to decipher the work and provide feedback.‍
• Architects orchestrate the right tech stack and drive technical design decisions. No-code projects require effective databases with strong data design and a eye for security and performance, which is why they still require an architect. But since many no-code tools integrate multiple functions into a single tool, these projects may use fewer tools (though not always — your team should prioritize optimal functionality over sheer number of tools).
  • Example: Airtable combines the database layer with a pseudo computer/server layer for automations and a pseudo UI/UX layer for interfaces. But these layers have limitations: data record limits, limited number of automations, and lack of interface customization options, to name a few. That's why it may be better to use some components of Airtable but not others. It all depends on your unique situation — that's why custom-designed solutions are better than pre-packaged software products.
• While you can separate the roles of UI/UX Designers if desired, many skilled designers can meet both of these needs without increasing team size.‍
• Full-Stack Developer(s) are still essential for no-code development teams, but thanks to the relative ease of these tools, 1 or 2 full-stack devs can typically handle both back-end and front-end development. That's because all the logistical messiness that comes with traditional code — DevOps, project configuration, servers — is abstracted away, creating room for developers to focus on UI/UX and business logic.

Thanks to the efficiency of no-code tools, developers can spend more time collaborating with one another and interfacing with clients to develop the right solution.

The Software Development Process from Scratch: Iterative Development and Key Considerations

Many articles outline the software development process as though it's a linear approach, also known as "waterfall." You would develop your scope, build a draft, edit that draft, and achieve a final product.

But most software projects don't work that way — instead, they take an iterative approach. Let's learn more about what that means and how it impacts the traditional concept of an end-to-end process.

Waterfall vs. Iterative Development and Agile Methodology for Software Development

Waterfall

Waterfall project management methodology involves defining a scope, building a wireframe or prototype, and refining the product internally (often on a strict pre-determined timeline) until it's complete and ready to be released.

Waterfall projects take awhile to launch, since the product isn't usually deployed at the end of each feedback cycle. And with cascading milestones, if any one review goes off the rails, the rest of the project scope and timeline must be rebuilt.

Iterative/Agile

In iterative development or agile methodology, it's a given that your software project will go through multiple versions, reviews, updates, and tweaks throughout the development process — and that won't stop you from releasing the product early and re-releasing often.

In agile methodology, you work in sprints. 

Sprints are short cycles (typically 1-4 weeks each) in which you ideate, build, test, and refine, typically releasing the software application in its current state at the end of each sprint. 

While sprints typically work on a strict review cycle, you aren't held to a specific deliverable in the same way a waterfall project would be.

When you develop software this way, you anticipate that you'll learn as you go, release the product in increments, and build on each release with feedback along the way.

This is typically the best approach for software development projects. It allows you to get to market faster! You also have the benefit of expecting the unexpected — scope creep, feedback delays, etc. — while avoiding significant impact to the overall project and timeline.