Software Design Document¶
A software design document—sometimes called software design specification—is a detailed plan for developing a piece of software. An SDD should outline the finished software’s functionality (specs) and your team’s plans to build it (timeline, goals, etc.).
Software design documents break down nearly every aspect of a software development project: What problem will the software solve? What will the final product look like? How does the internal architecture function?
By creating a software design document, your engineering team and other stakeholders can establish exact expectations for the project before you start coding. SDDs also help streamline the coding process. To create an SDD, you have to think through your entire system architecture before writing any code. This allows you to anticipate any snags or roadblocks and plan around them. As various team members work to build out their respective parts of the software, there’s a centralized document that outlines features, dependencies, and other useful bits of information.