Software Engineering Institute

If a software architecture is a key business asset for an organization, then architectural analysis must also be a key practice for that organization. Why? Because architectures are complex and involve many design tradeoffs. Without undertaking a formal analysis process, the organization cannot ensure that the architectural decisions made—particularly those which affect the achievement of quality attribute such as performance, availability, security, and modifiability—are advisable ones that appropriately mitigate risks. In this report, we will discuss some of the technical and organizational foundations for performing architectural analysis, and will present the Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method (ATAM) a technique for analyzing software architectures that we have developed and refined in practice over the past three years.