SATURN 2012 IEEE Software Plenary Talk: Frances Paulisch, Standardizing Speed and Security for Software-Based Systems

Standardizing Speed and Security for Software-Based Systems
Frances Paulisch, Siemens Corporate Technology

Common thematic trend at SATURN: people and culture. Change from command and control to more empowerment, autonomy, enabling people to make decentralized decisions. Conveying vision so people can make decisions in the right way is a more motivating way to work together.

Software initiative at Siemens will take on more of a governance role. Siemens has issues with embedded-system complexity. Software is not subject to law of physics. There are more interfaces with potential threats as well as benefits. As software interconnects with everything, that poses more threats, and there are more threats out there in the cyber world.

SATURN 2012 Keynote: Michael Stal, Win-Win With Agile Architecture

Win-Win with Agile Architecture
Michael Stal, Siemens Corporate Research

This keynote covered software architecture and how it can be combined with Agile in systematic way; perspectives on agility and architecture.

“Experts solve problems, geniuses avoid them” (Einstein). Architects should be geniuses.

Architecture and design are two sides of the coin. If you knew everything in advance, you could design the best architecture. Waterfall would be a perfect fit.  But the real world is not perfect.

The other side of the coin is represented by the Agile Manifesto. In software architecture, embracing change is important. However, change should be planned.

Something for Everyone at SATURN 2012

Whether you are an aspiring software architect or an experienced practitioner, the SATURN 2012 Conference offers courses, presentations, tutorials, and talks tailored to your level of knowledge and experience.

Relative newcomers to architecture-centric engineering and development can take the introductory course in the SEI Software Architecture Curriculum, Software Architecture: Principles and Practices (SAPP) on Monday and Tuesday, May 7-8 at a discounted price. This popular course, offered each year at SATURN and taught this year by Rob Wojcik of the SEI, introduces participants to the essentials of software architecture. Also offered at SATURN this year is a half-day tutorial on Tuesday, May 8 by Peter Eeles of IBM Rational titled Software Architect 101. This tutorial (T1) provides attendees with a solid grounding in all aspects of software architecture and a framework on which they can build a deeper understanding of the role of the architect. Other Tuesday tutorials cover effective stakeholder collaboration (T2), integration of software architecture-centric methods into object-oriented analysis and design (T3), and architectural implications of cloud computing (T4).

New SEI Advanced Software Architecture Workshop to be Offered at SATURN 2012

A new course from the SEI, Advanced Software Architecture Workshop, will be offered publicly  for the first time at SATURN 2012 in St. Petersburg, Florida on May 7 and 8. Register now.

The course, taught by Felix H. Bachmann of the SEI, is targeted to

• software architects and software lead designers who want to practice what they learned in the SEI software architecture curriculum, and
• seasoned software architects who want to get ready for a project that requires major architecture improvements

Architecture-Centric Engineering in the Financial Industry, Part Two

Last week, we posted a link here to an article at the SEI blog about how Bursatec, the technology arm of Groupo Bolsa Mexicana de Valores (BMV, the Mexican Stock Exchange), used architecture-centric engineering to respond to its challenges.

Part two of this article was posted today: Using Team Software Process (TSP) to Architect a New Trading System, by James McHale.

Case Study: Architecture-Centric Engineering in Financial Industry

Bursatec, the technology arm of Groupo Bolsa Mexicana de Valores (BMV, the Mexican Stock Exchange), recently embarked on a project to replace three existing trading engines with one system developed in house. Given the competitiveness of global financial markets and recent interest in Latin American economies, Bursatec needed a reliable and fast new system that could work ceaselessly throughout the day and handle sharp fluctuations in trading volume. To meet these demands, the SEI suggested combining elements of its Architecture Centric Engineering (ACE) method, which requires effective use of software architecture to guide system development, with its Team Software Process (TSP), which teaches software developers the skills they need to make and track plans and produce high-quality products. This post at the SEI blog by Felix Bachmann—the first in a two-part series—provides a case study of how Bursatec used architecture-centric engineering to respond to its challenges.

Improving Testing Outcomes Through Software Architecture – Paul Clements

Testing plays a critical role in the development of software-reliant systems. Even with the most diligent efforts of requirements engineers, designers, and programmers, faults inevitably occur. These faults are most commonly discovered and removed by testing the system and comparing what it does to what it is supposed to do. This blog post at the SEI Blog by Paul Clements summarizes a method that improves testing outcomes (including efficacy and cost) in a software-reliant system by using an architectural design approach that describes a coherent set of architectural decisions taken by architects to help meet the behavioral and quality attribute requirements of systems being developed.

See also these additional posts by Paul here on the SATURN blog about architecture support for testing.

Free SEI Webinar 6/23: Service-Oriented Architecture: A Quality Attribute Perspective

On Thursday, June 23 from 1:30 to 2:30 Eastern time, Grace Lewis of the SEI will present a free SEI webinar, titled “Service-Oriented Architecture: A Quality Attribute Perspective.”

Register.

About the Webinar

Service orientation is an approach to software systems development that has become a popular way to implement distributed, loosely coupled systems, because it offers such features as standardization, platform independence, well-defined interfaces, and tool support that enables legacy-system integration. From a quality attribute point of view, the primary drivers for service-orientation adoption are interoperability and modifiability. However, a common misconception is that an architecture that uses a service-oriented approach can achieve these qualities by simply putting together a set of vendor products that provide an infrastructure and then using this infrastructure to expose a set of reusable services to build systems. In reality, there are many architectural decisions that need to be made. An architectural decision that promotes interoperability or modifiability can negatively impact other qualities, such as availability, reliability, security, and performance. This presentation will talk about  the effect that service orientation has on system quality attributes.

Architectural style-spotting (Paul Clements)

I enjoy finding places in the world where concepts I work with daily exist in different forms. In Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns, one of the sidebars is about the product lines of manufactured goods that I see all around–cars, newspapers, suburban houses, light bulbs, and so on. Recently in this blog I wrote about stylized subway maps and argued that these are architectural representations. (This week I was in Venice, Italy, and saw the same kind of map for its ubiquitous water-based mass transit system, the vaporetti.)

Several years ago I read a wonderful article in the Smithsonian Institute’s Air and Space magazine entitled How the 747 Got Its Hump. Besides answering that question, the article also talked about why, for example, almost all cargo aircraft look alike in a few important ways: Engines in the wings, wings mounted high on the fuselage, a short main landing gear snuggled against the body of the aircraft, and a rear-opening cargo door.

Here are a few examples.  All are in service today, although some of the designs date back to the 1950s.

Lockheed C-130

Lockheed C-141

Boeing C-17

Antonov AN-124

SOA and Cloud Computing: Hot Topics at SATURN 2011

In celebration of the 7th year for the SATURN Conference, this year’s SATURN technical program is organized around “7 things you need to know about the next 7 years in architecture.” One of the themes we will explore at SATURN 2011 is service-oriented architecture and cloud computing. We have invited leading practitioners and industry experts to discuss their ideas and experiences on SOA and cloud computing.

Highlights include the following: