The cost of software maintenance can be high. However, this doesn’t negate its importance. In certain cases, software maintenance can cost up to two-thirds of the entire Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) or more than 50% of the SDLC processes.
The costs involved in software maintenance are due to multiple factors and vary depending on the specific situation. The older the software, the more maintenance will cost, as technologies (and coding languages) change over time. Revamping an old piece of software to meet today’s technology can be an exceptionally expensive process in certain situations.
In addition, engineers may not always be able to target the exact issues when looking to upgrade or maintain a specific piece of software. This causes them to use a trial-and-error method, which can result in many hours of work.
There are certain ways to try and bring down software maintenance costs. These include optimizing the top of programming used in the software, strong typing, and functional programming.
When creating new software as well as taking on maintenance projects for older models, you must take software maintenance costs into consideration. Without maintenance, any software will be obsolete and essentially useless over time.