Incremental Software Architecture

Part ThreeEnd-State Architecture Decomposition

The art of architecture decomposition¹ has been discussed extensively in research literature during the past few decades. This research delves into the methods and explores different motives for architecture decomposition. Some focus on breaking down applications; others raise the perspective to subdivision of systems on an enterprise level. The leading cause for pursuing segmentation of an architecture, according to some studies, is chiefly rooted in improving design and increasing software component reuse. This typically calls for dissecting software implementations into smaller units. Such subdivision is performed to foster distribution of software entities, such as tiers and layers, to achieve high cohesion. Striving for high cohesion means separating software components to achieve loosely coupled design. This typically reduces architecture complexity and enables easier maintenance of software assets.

In this book, however, the justification for decomposing an end-state architecture is entrenched in promoting the practice of incremental software architecture. True, design improvement and increasing software reuse are still noble goals to achieve. Helping enterprise architects to produce a potent enterprise grand-scale design is another imperative goal that should not be ignored.

In addition to these end-state architecture decomposition benefits, the promise here is utterly clear: Before committing budgets and resources and launching ...