Development strategies?

A software manager is involved in the project development of a software design support system that supports the translation of software requirements to a formal software specification. Comment on the advantages and disadvantages of the following development strategies:

a. Develop a throw-away prototype, evaluate, it then review the system requirements. Develop the final system using C.

b. Develop the system from the existing requirements using Java, then modify it to adapt to any changed user requirements.

c. Develop the system using incremental development with a user involved in the development team.

a. prototype makes sure customer and developers have the same understanding of what's required, and both parties get a deeper understanding of what can be done.
But, it's just throwaway stuff which will be never used - so it costs more. But, the cost is justified since the customer might quit after the prototype, saving the cost of the full system, or be able to change requirements earlier, which is cheaper than doing so later.

b. What's developed may be out of whack with what the customer wanted and couldn't articulate. Customer might then decide to not pay, since what's developed isn't what they wanted. Developers can't sue, because then nobody will hire them ever again.
Modifications are always cheaper early on and more expensive afterwards.
Advantages? hmmm. Well, kind of good if a really clear set of requirements exists - government tender type projects.

c. incremental is good, customer gets little pieces of functionality with different releases, rather than absolutely nothing up until the final release. Also good to pick up requirement changes earlier, and customer can keep saying "do this bit next" until they've got what they want.
disadvantages... ummm... user involved in the development team will cost more, but the cost is likely to be less than going with (b).

hope that helps!