WICSA 2005:BoFs
From WICSA Conference Wiki
BOF PROPOSAL: WHAT DO SOFTWARE ARCHITECTS ACTUALLY DO? AND HOW DO THEY LEARN HOW TO DO IT?
(Paul Clements, Len Bass, Rick Kazman)
Software architecture has emerged as a fundamental part of software engineering. A search of on-line booksellers reveals no fewer than 58 titles containing the phrase “software architecture”. But there are almost no books or other resources about being a software architect. Although the software architect is one of the most important technical people on any software project, the best (if not the only) source of information about their day-to-day duties comes from on-the-job training. Practicing software architects spend much of their time engaged in many activities other than making design decisions for the architecture. They have to deal with personnel issues, team-building, increment planning, funding, making presentations to the customer, making presentations to developers, mentoring, training, engaging stakeholders, answering questions, planning and presiding over reviews, and a hundred other things.
This BOF session is intended to discuss the question: What do software architects really do? And how do they learn how to do it?
Click here for the discussion on this topic.
BOF PROPOSAL: IEEE Std 1471
(Rich Hilliard)
IEEE Std 1471, Recommended Practice for Architectural Description of Software-Intensive Systems was approved for use by IEEE in 2000. A year later, it became an ANSI standard. Now IEEE 1471 is beginning its (5 year) revision. This revision will likely take place in conjunction with ISO, because ISO/IEC JTC1/SC7 requested it be submitted for their examination. This examination has been completed. IEEE has submitted IEEE 1471 to JTC1 for a fast-track ballot. The current idea is that ISO would adopt IEEE 1471 following such a ballot and that then there would be the opportunity for a joint IEEE/ISO coordinated revision. The revision would be able to take into account integration of IEEE 1471 into the ISO and IEEE software/systems engineering life cycles, and its coordination with related standards, such as ISO RM-ODP (Reference Model for Open Distributed Processing) and ISO GERAM (Enterprise Architecture). We'll be working to harmonize IEEE 1471 with the definitions in those two ISO standards, and to incorporate lessons learned from its last five years of use.
This BOF will discuss:
- experiences with IEEE 1471,
- extensions and improvements, and
- anything else pertaining to use of the standard.
Hopefully, this BOF can be scheduled at a time of convenience for all interested parties.
BOF PROPOSAL: Role of software architects in an off-shoring environment
(Kong Posh Bhat, Samsung Telecommunications America)
The economics of offshoring comes at a hefty price ---- the loss of physical proximity between software architects and software implementers. To be honest, the issues go beyond national boundaries, time zones and differences between work cultures. No longer can implementers walk over to the software architects’ office to gain an insight into what goes on in the architects’ mind. No longer can architects rely on sharing their vision by word of mouth. In fact, the software architects and the software implementers may never even cross each other’s paths! In such a scenario, ensuring that the spirit of the original architecture remains intact is a challenging endeavor. Who should be performing the “architecture policing” role ----- the original architect, or someone else? How can the software architects facilitate the process of making architectural adherence more trackable? Better documentation? Increased guidance to the test teams? What additional responsibilities do software architects need to assume? What can be done to reduce the risk that these additional responsibilities become hassles and distractions that stifle the architects’ creativity?
Hopefully, this BOF can be scheduled at a time of convenience for all interested parties.
BOF PROPOSAL (Jeff Tyree) – A FORUM FOR DISCUSSING THE KEY CHALLENGES FACED BY PRACTICING ARCHITECTS
There are a myriad of challenges facing practicing architects, some of which are discussed in the WICSA4 Research Challenges. From my perspective, topics not explicitly discussed at this conference include:
- How do I efficiently leverage work from the academic field? Barriers to leveraging work from the academic field include (1) much of the academic work appears to be unrelated to what is actually done in the field. As most of the work is not domain specific, it requires considerable effort from the reader to pull-out relevant portions for using in the applied domain; (2) the information is not readily available to all readers. If information is not freely available on the web or consolidated for easy consumption in reference texts, then it will probably not be read by the majority of architects.
- How do I maintain my architectural artifacts? A useful discussion would center on what strategies other architects use to keep the deliverables from becoming stale.
- What are the best techniques for achieving buy-in? What techniques have architects found to be useful (and reusable) for obtaining (and keeping) buy-in from appropriate stakeholders? What techniques have been used to find which stakeholders “really matter”?
- What socialization techniques are primarily used? What are the communication channels used for communicating the architecture to various stakeholders?
- What are best practices in architecture governance? This, of course, could be its own workshop. What are the lessons learned and best practices in the enforcement of architecture?
BOF PROPOSAL: Will there ever be a Unified Architecture Method UAM ?
(Christine Hofmeister, Rod Nord, Henk Obbink)
Topics:
- continue the discussion from Henk's presentation on Monday on Generalizing a Model of Software Architecture Design from Five Industrial Approaches.
- come to the session and tell everyone how you design architecture and let's discuss how it might fit our general model.
- discuss the question posed by Henk, Will there ever be a Unified Architecture Method UAM ?
Click here for a discussion that has started on the topic.
