Software Architecture in Practice, Third Edition

23. Economic Analysis of Architectures

Arthur Dent: “I think we have different value systems.” Ford Prefect: “Well mine’s better.”

—Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

Thus far, we have been primarily investigating the relationships between architectural decisions and the quality attributes that the architecture’s stakeholders have deemed important: If I make this architectural decision, what effect will it have on the quality attributes? If I have to achieve that quality attribute requirement, what architectural decisions will do the trick?

As important as this effort is, this perspective is missing a crucial consideration: What are the economic implications of an architectural decision?

Usually an economic discussion is focused on costs, primarily ...