While there's a specific advocacy opportunity that inspires formation of this page in May 2007, the question legitimately recurs, and is likely to interest many readers.

"Application lifecycle" here encompasses such aspects of development as
 * requirements--[[UML]]
 * design--
 * development--DevelopmentTools include IntegratedDevelopmentEnvironments and PythonEditors; [[implementation]]s; ...
 * build--[[http://www.python.org/pypi/zc.buildout|zc.buildout]]; (deployment solutions or DistributionUtilities)
 * test--[[static source analysis]]; run-time testing tools including [[http://docs.python.org/lib/module-unittest.html|pytest]], [[http://docs.python.org/lib/module-doctest.html|doctest]], and [[http://www.python.org/pypi/zope.testing|zope.testing]]; (testing taxonomy)
 * documentation--DocumentationTools