<P> In project management a project can be defined both with a project life cycle (PLC) and an SDLC, during which slightly different activities occur . According to Taylor (2004), "the project life cycle encompasses all the activities of the project, while the systems development life cycle focuses on realizing the product requirements". </P> <P> SDLC is used during the development of an IT project, it describes the different stages involved in the project from the drawing board, through the completion of the project . </P> <P> The SDLC is not a methodology per se, but rather a description of the phases in the life cycle of a software application . These phases (broadly speaking) are, investigation, analysis, design, build, test, implement, and maintenance and support . All software development methodologies (such as the more commonly known waterfall and scrum methodologies) follow the SDLC phases but the method of doing that varies vastly between methodologies . In the Scrum methodology, for example, one could say a single user story goes through all the phases of the SDLC within a single two - week sprint . Contrast this to the waterfall methodology, as another example, where every business requirement (recorded in the analysis phase of the SDLC in a document called the Business Requirements Specification) is translated into feature / functional descriptions (recorded in the design phase in a document called the Functional Specification) which are then all built in one go as a collection of solution features typically over a period of three to nine months, or more . These methodologies are obviously quite different approaches yet, they both contain the SDLC phases in which a requirement is born, then travels through the life cycle phases ending in the final phase of maintenance and support, after - which (typically) the whole life cycle starts again for a subsequent version of the software application . </P> <P> The product life cycle describes the process for building information systems in a very deliberate, structured and methodical way, reiterating each stage of the product's life . The systems development life cycle, according to Elliott & Strachan & Radford (2004), "originated in the 1960s, to develop large scale functional business systems in an age of large scale business conglomerates . Information systems activities revolved around heavy data processing and number crunching routines". </P>

Correct sequence of various phases of systems approach