Software developers are involved at all levels of the software purchase process, with 43% often involved with evaluating software and 50% sometimes involved. Only 7% are never involved according to the recently released Evans Data Global Development Survey, a survey of developers worldwide conducted in six languages this fall.

Just over 50% spend between one and four hours evaluating software, not including time spent on downloading, installing and configuring the software - a task that takes between five and 30 minutes for 70% of the developers in the survey. Developers in the EMEA region spend the least time on their evaluations, with 29% spending less than an hour, while North Americans spend the most time.

"Developers are crucial to software use throughout an organization," said Janel Garvin, CEO of Evans Data, "They are looked up to as experts and often find themselves evaluating software for line of business units as well as their own tools and platforms."

Good documentation is critical in the evaluation process, with 60% citing that as one of the first few things they look for. A clean startup experience without any bugs is also something developers look for, and that is especially true in North America.

The new Global Development Survey, now in its 19th year, is a worldwide survey of developers focusing on a variety of technologies. It provides a margin of error of 2.8%. The full 224 page report includes sections on Demographics, Platforms, Mobile Development, Cloud development, UI and UX development, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, Software Evaluations and Purchasing, High Performance Computing, Development Lifecycle, and much more!