m3poulin

This question might seem strange in 2010 but when we look at debates around Enterprise Architecture (EA), I think it is a quite right time to look at what we deal with. When we know what an architecture is, we can talk about different types of architecture, actually, defining the scope of it, special types of relationships and principles. This will give us the definition of EA.

So, there is no single and unitedly accepted definition of ‘Architecture’ exists. To define this term, I have noted five core concepts of the IEEE 1471 standard: “every system has an architecture, but an architecture is not a system; an architecture and an architecture description are not the same thing; architecture standards, descriptions, and development processes can differ and be developed separately; architecture descriptions are inherently multi-viewed; separate the object's views from their specification�. For my task, the most important concept out of these five is that “an architecture and an architecture description are not the same thing�, i.e. external views and descriptions of the architecture do not necessary reflect the reality but rather a subjective preferences of the viewer.

I also reviewed several works (Zachmann, 1987; Armour et al., 1999; Boar, 1999; Masak, 2004; Krafzig et al., 2004) devoted to this theme looking for a consensus on the semantically similar characteristics. Finally, I derived my definition from the definition given in IEEE 1471 standard, paragraph 3.5, p.3: “The fundamental organization of a system embodied in its components, their relationships to each other and to the environment and the principles guiding its design and evolution� and formulated it as the following:
"An architecture is an organization of a system embodied in its fundamental self-containing cohesive components, their relationships to each other and to the environment, and the principles guiding its design and evolution�

What do you think? To me, added "self-containing cohesive" is very important because this allows me to distinguish between real 'informative attribute' and a derived one, between related attribute and a one appeared in somebody's external/subjective view.

So, what do you think about such definition of Architecture?