Reviews for Software Systems Architecture: Working With Stakeholders Using Viewpoints and Perspectives

1. A very good companion for system architects

   Rated 5 out of 5 stars, January 12nd, 2007

   This book will serve the new and experienced architects equally. For new architects, it provides an excellent guide to a fairly contemporary world of systems architecture and helps in looking at it from various "viewpoints" and "perspectives" used by the author. This will help enormously in finding a rationale for choice of methods in any part of architecture you are involved in, be it application, data, infrastructure, security, performance & scalability etc. For the experienced ones, it will help in focussing on a particular area and delve into it in more detail. I found the examples cited to be useful and author's usage of structure UML to illustrate the examples. I would also suggest to read the Bass, Clements' book on Documenting software architecture together with this book.

2. Every IT architect should read this book

   Rated 5 out of 5 stars, December 12th, 2005

   My reason for buying this book was to hear what the authors had to say about handling cross-cutting architectural concerns (such as security), which they refer to as "perspectives". The authors offer refreshing insights into how such concerns should be interwoven with the architecture views/viewpoints with which many architects will already be familiar when documenting their software architectures.

   But now that I've finally finished reading the book (500+ pages) I have to say that this book is so much more. This is essentially a "book of 2 halves". The first half discusses fundamental architecture concepts, and various elements of the architecture process. However, the second half of the book is dedicated to a catalog of viewpoints and a catalog of perspectives. These sections are, I think, the most valuable, and offer probably the best overview of different architectural concerns (such as concurrency, deployment, operations, security, availability etc.) I've come across. And the whole book is liberally sprinkled with pragmatic advice, and examples, based on the authors' experiences.

   In summary, the book makes a great "handbook" for both novice and experienced architects.

3. Stop those arguments about what architecture actually is!

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, November 12th, 2005

   Full disclosure: I used to work with Nick and Eoin in Sybase UK's consulting division. One of the ongoing arguments we would always have was, what exactly architecture, when applied to software systems, actually is. So, finally, I have a book that I can point to and say, the stuff that's in there is a pretty good basis for what architecture is for and more importantly how architects should do it. And (please believe me), these two guys definitely know how to do it.

   The book builds on the old 4+1 viewpoints stuff, though Nick and Eoin rename some of them for clarity. They've also introduced one further one to end up with 6 in all. Then they've introduced a new concept - perspectives - that serves as a handle for all the cross-cutting stuff, eg security, i18n and so on. So we have a 2-dimensional space of things to think about.

   Of course, it's impossible for any architect to fully explore this space before the building must begin, but in this book the authors help show how to prioritize work best to maximise success.

   If there's one thing this book skirts around, it is how architecture fits into agile development processes. But if you are an architect who's always bluffed it, or a developer wanting to move into architecture, then I recommend you buy this book.