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Software architects are not building architects -- or are they? Software, like many other new age disciplines, is at a loss to build on any foundations other than metaphorical relationships to timeless disciplines. These metaphors lend an aura of pseudo-credibility to the craft. Though all metaphors break down somewhere, it's important to explore these metaphors so we can properly build on the experience of other disciplines, avoiding their pitfalls while not falling into the traps that arise from following the metaphors blindly.We propose (but not promise) to bring a (hopefully prominent) architect to the venue to fuel the activity.
This workshop builds on results from a workshop at OT 1999 that explored the architecture metaphor using a formal sociological research technique called grounded theory development. The effort is half done; we have yet to explore the detailed questions whose answers can add density and life to the theory of software architecture practice.
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Lucent Technologies, Bell Labs Innovations | James ("Cope") Coplien is a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at Bell Laboratories in Naperville, Illinois, USA. He was guest editor of the September/October 1999 IEEE Software Special Issue on Software Architecture which explored piecemeal growth styles of software development, featuring the first publication of Christopher Alexander's landmark 1996 OOPSLA keynote. Cope conducts research in the architecture of third party customizable telecommunications platforms and software architecture patterns. He also conducts research in the analogous organizational structures using ethnographic techniques and, most recently, techniques from grounded theory development. He is a well-known author of books and columns on object-oriented programming, C++, patterns, and software organizations. He enjoys collecting turkish carpets, scuba, and travel. When he grows up, he wants to be an anthropologist.
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EDS | Martine Devos is reuse and method consultant for EDS. She was director of
the IS
department at the Belgian department of education (Argo) since 1992 and
before
has worked as teacher, as technical consultant and project leader to the
Belgian
Minister of Education and the Civil Service. As IS manager she introduced
objec
ts and she initiated, and co-ordinated the development of a framework and
severa
l applications using it. Her main focus is on the use of IS - and "softer
softwa
re" - to support change programs and learning. Special interests are
framework d
evelopment, the use of patterns in organisation, the human side of IS and
facili
tating workshops. She participated in, and organised, several workshops and
pane
ls on System Envisioning, the use of creativity in requirements developing.
She
is program-chair of EuroPlop 2000
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OT'99 's workshop converged on change, role interaction, structure, economics, constraints, process and professionalism as groups. Constraints has the tightest coupling to other categories.
The basic story line: the architect is to balance constraints that arise from customers, standards, economics and the people involved in the process...
Following questions may help:
| Session: Workshop 170 minutes | Level: intermediate |
| Audience: Any software professional who is an architect or who works closely with a software architect. The session will be tuned to an audience of architects. The session is not limited to titled architects but to anyone who participates in the elusively defined activity design, one of whose fruits is an architecture. We encourage and seek professionals from the building profession as key contributors in this workshop. | Max unlimited |
One technique we will use is the writing of highly structured short stories or poems that shed light on the questions, drawing directly on the work experiences that participants bring to the workshop. We employ a structured form to hone thinking more than to strive for normatization.
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