documenting software architecture

DR. HIMANSHU HORASRMS COLLEGE OF ENGG. & TECH.,BAREILLY

INDIA

Documenting Software Architecture

Theme of topic

Documenting the architecture is the crowning step to crafting it. Good architecture documentation is the fruit which stakeholder get from herculean effort of one person SYSTEM ARCHITECT and if the stakeholders not been able to understand the whole effort will have been wasted.

So documentation should have to be easy in reading as well as in understanding.

Uses of architectural documentation

“Documentation is to write from the point of view of the reader”

The architecture of the system depends on the requirement levied on it.

Should be sufficiently abstract.Should be detailed also to serve as blueprint.Understand who the stakeholder are, this will

help in documentation.

Views

A software architecture for a system as “the structure or the structures of the system , which comprise elements , the externally visible properties of those elements , and relationship among them”

View – representation of a coherent set of architectural elements as written and read by stakeholders.

Documenting an architecture is a matter of documenting the relevant view and then adding documentation that applies to more than one view.

Backbone of the architecture documentation:- Choosing the relevant view. Documenting the view. Documenting information that applies to more than

one view.

Choosing the relevant view

Simple three steps of choosing:-

Produce candidate view list

Combine views

Prioritize

Documenting a view

Primary presentationElement catalogContext diagramVariability guideArchitecture backgroundGlossary of termsOther information

Documenting behavior

Views represent structural information about the system

Structural information alone is not sufficientBehavior add information that reveals the

ordering of interaction among the elements etc.

In UML , sequence and state chart diagram are example of behavior.

Documenting interface template

Interface identityData type definitionsException definitionsResources provided

Resource syntax Resource semantics Resource usage restriction

Variability provided by the interfaceQuality attribute characteristics of the

interfaceElement requirementsRationale and design issueUsage guide

DR. HIMANSHU HORASRMS COLLEGE OF ENGG. & TECH.,BAREILLY

INDIA

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