Want to make big money in a low-stress job? Be a software architect

…says CNN/Money.com.

In the CNN/Money list of top-paying jobs, software architect ranked No. 8. Likewise in the list of least stressful jobs.

Another usability/software architecture link

For those interested in the relation between usability and software architecture, my colleague in this work–Bonnie John of the Human Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University–gave a talk a while ago at Stanford on the work. You can see her talk on YouTube:

Usability and Software Architecture: The Forgotten Problems

- Len Bass, SEI

SEI Webinar Series: Cloud Computing by Grace Lewis

“The push to promote cloud computing is part of the Obama administration’s effort to modernize the government information technology systems,” according to a September 15, 2009 New York Times article highlighting the unveiling of Apps.Gov, a virtual storefront run by the General Services Administration where federal agencies will be able to purchase cloud computing applications and services such as productivity software, storage, and web hosting.

Jim Highsmith to Keynote at SATURN 2010

We’re excited to announce that acclaimed author and leader of the Agile movement Jim Highsmith will be a keynote speaker for the SEI Architecture Technology User Network Conference (SATURN 2010), May 17 – 21, 2010 in Minneapolis, Minn.

Computer Science at Internet Scale

This article in the New York Times discusses a strictly computer-science aspect of ultra-large-scale systems.

Developmental qualities

The community has done a good job in describing and understanding techniques for achieving operational qualities. Performance, availability, security, and usability have been well studied from the point of view of definitions and techniques to achieve them.

Architecture of Ultra-Large-Scale (ULS) Systems

On Thursday, October 1, Len Bass of the SEI spoke on the University of Minnesota campus at a meeting of the Twin Cities Software Process Improvement Network (Twin-SPIN) about the architecture of ultra-large-scale (ULS) systems. Len’s presentation slides from the talk are now online.

The Twin-SPIN event gave us an opportunity to network with the Minneapolis academic and business communities. SATURN 2010 will be held in Minneapolis, Minn. this year on May 17-21, in collaboration with IEEE Software magazine.

Modeling in Cold Blood

I’ve been thinking about the issue of modeling and documentation. While many within the Agile community embrace the concept of “modeling with a purpose,” there is also a widespread view of documentation as an after-the-fact, template-based activity that generates unused shelfware. To me, this dichotomy can best be expressed as the difference between acting “in the heat of passion” and acting “in cold blood.”

Observations from the WICSA/ECSA 2009 Conference

Last month I attended the Joint Working IEEE/IFIP Conference on Software Architecture and European Conference on Software Architecture (WICSA/ECSA 2009).

This was the eighth WICSA offering in a series of conferences beginning in 1999.