Software Architecture

What is a “software architect” anyway? And how do individuals and organizations get better at software architecture?

Paul Clements of Carnegie-Mellon’s Software Engineering Institute looked at these issues in “Measuring and Improving Architecture Competence,” a presentation in IASA Architecture Thinking Series sponsored by Microsoft.

Points along the way:

• Clements’ team conducted a survey of broadcast, training & educational, and “architecting for a living” sources. He focused on what people say software architecture is rather than debating what it should be in order to develop a model of duties, skills, and knowledge was developed
• Communication — listening, writing, speaking — and interpersonal skills — leadership, patience, and politics — are critical capabilities
• As one might expect, training & educational sources values that differ with “architecting for living” sources
• Architects should be “jacks of all trades” who can readily identify a solution that they’ve previously applied to a similar problem previously
• Competence is: Carrying out duties, having the skills, knowing the knowledge

It was interesting to note that this talk was targeted — both by time of day and also through side comments — to India’s software organization.

An archived version of the presentation is supposed to be available from the IASA web site later this week.