...Enterprise Architecture Vol. 11, No. 10 10 Key Skills Architects Must Have to Deliver Value by Michael Rosen, Director, Cutter Consortium Enterprise Architecture Practice As the complexity of IT grows, more and more organizations are realizing the need for architecture. But the definition of what architecture is, the titles that architects have, and the role of an architect vary widely from one organization to another. Business, IT, management, and even architects don’t necessarily know what a good architect does to add value in his or her organization. This Executive Report discusses the role of the architect and describes 10 activities that architects should perform to add value to projects. ABOUT CUTTER CONSORTIUM Access to the Experts Cutter Consortium is a unique IT advisory firm, comprising a group of more than 100 internationally recognized experts who have come together to offer content, consulting, and training to our clients. These experts are committed to delivering top-level, critical, and objective advice. They have done, and are doing, groundbreaking work in organizations worldwide, helping companies deal with issues in the core areas of software development and agile project management, enterprise architecture, business technology trends and strategies, innovation, enterprise risk management, metrics, and sourcing. Cutter offers a different value proposition than other IT research firms: We give you Access to the Experts....
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...CSI Enterprise Architecture Justification Paper XXXXX X. XXXXXXXXX University of Maryland University College 26 January 2014 Enterprise architecture is an abstract blueprint that is utilized to define the structure and operation of an organization. Enterprise architecture is aimed at determining how an organization can attain its current objectives and future objectives timely, efficiently and effectively. The architecture is divided into business, application and information perspectives. The business perspective identifies the processes and standards by which the business operates on daily basis. The application perspective defines the interaction between different processes and standards used by the organization. The information perspective defines and groups raw data in the organization like document file databases, presentations, spreadsheets that the organization needs to operate well. The technology perspective defines the hardware, OS, programming and networking systems used by the organization. Enterprise architecture has various advantages. It improves decision making and makes it easy for an organization to adapt to changing demands and market conditions. It also helps an organization eliminate inefficient and redundant processes and use its assets to its overall advantage. Enterprise architecture is a strategic planning process that converts a business vision and strategy into effective enterprise change. An enterprise architecture program is important...
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...Booch’s article “The Irrelevance of Architecture” (May/June 2007). Way too many people already feel that architecture is irrelevant, and they’ll be tempted to read the misleading title, skip the article, and forever use Booch as proof of their erroneous beliefs about architecture. Additionally, I should admonish Booch for the invalid assumptions and errors of omission his article propounded on the way to reaching an otherwise good conclusion—namely, that architecture is quite relevant. A better conclusion would have been that a proper systems architecture is vital, desires of the agile cowboy coding hackers notwithstanding. One always has an architecture. It might have been done explicitly; otherwise, it’s ultimately defined by whatever the developers came up with. It all depends on which end of the dog is wagging the other. And this is not some Big-Endian vs. Little-Endian religious dispute (see Danny Cohen’s article “On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace” in the October 1981 issue of Computer). When it comes to dogs, the tail should be the thing wagged, just as a design should be dictated by an architecture. And architecture is relevant to the end users. Without starting with a proper systems architecture, the end result won’t serve users well. They might not care about the implementation details, but they do care that the interface and functionality suit their needs when delivered. Although Booch observes the generic relationship between architecture and implementation, he omits the...
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...No Enterprise is an Island Enterprise architecture in the internet era must accommodate multiple platforms and user communities By Meir Shargal & Yoav Intrator E-business is changing the way people work and communicate, requiring a different approach to enterprise architecture. Previously, systems revolved around a specific user community or platform. The system design, in most cases, coupled the user platform to the actual services. For example, a travel agency's system and applications targeted a single tier audience -- brokers -- and worked on a single platform, such as Green Screen. They supported one entry point, such as Web, fax, email, or voice response units (VRUs). In such a straightforward environment, developing systems based on the needs of that one group of users, and on the functionality of that specific platform, made sense. Today, business -- and the technology that supports it -- is more complex. During a typical work day, you may access a corporate extranet and check your inventory status at a supplier's warehouse, participate in a Web-based corporate discussion group, or receive an email message via your mobile PDA. Electronic communication now takes place across multiple platforms and among multiple companies, widening and blurring the boundaries of the individual enterprise. You can no longer neatly define users and systems, making the traditional user- or platform-focused approach to enterprise architecture inadequate. How you receive services changes...
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...of budgets that a hospital muse consider in order to redesign a whole new network structure for the purpose of being more optimal and maintaining standards that keep up with advances in new technology. In most cases, a hospital’s network can transition over time with new technology and evolve into meeting the demands it requires to perform effectively. However, upgrading a hospital’s entire network can often be very expensive to implement and sustain. There may be a case where components or parts are no longer being produced to meet current and future demands. In the last several years, changes in healthcare put a demand on hospitals to maintain their networks with new, more efficient solutions that can enhance performance, keep cost low, but most one that is reliable . The Network architecture at Patton-Fuller hospital was designed for each department to rely on information flow between each department. In other words, if the accounting department needed information...
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...Who were the stakeholders: Department of Navy, Chief Information Officers What was their business need? Reduce licensing costs, deliver consistent levels of support, and maintain operating cost while providing additional value. What was the larger business context and mission? The mission was to create greater information sharing strategies between the departments and organizations of the Navy while containing both operational and capital costs. How did you explicitly link the architecture to the business needs? The business needs expressed on the part of leadership drove a detailed requirements generation process to determine the business, technical, and operational details of the existing environment. These requirements I used to establish...
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...Business Analytics using Secured Cloud Storage System M Swetha Chandra1, M Suma Latha2, KODAVATIKANTI S M Aditya Kumar3, S K R Swamy4 1,2,3,4 Department of CSE, TRR College of Engineering, Inole, Patancheru, Hyderabad, AP, India 1 sweet.smily99@gmail.com 2 msumalathacse@gmail.com 3 smaditya@gmail.com 4 kramas2004@yahoo.com | | | ABSTRACT Business analytics go far beyond reports, dashboards, and scorecards. Analytic impact occurs after the numbers are delivered, and analytic value is driven by the kinds of questions that are answered. Ordinary analytics tell you what has already happened. Good analytics provide insight into why things happen, and great analytics provide foresight to see what lies ahead. Today’s business climate demands extraordinary analytics. Business managers need to know more than what. The hard questions today are why, what if, and what next. According to Gartner, BI and Analytics is a $12.2 billion market with 16.4% growth in 2011. Gartner's 2012 CIO survey showed that analytics/BI is the No. 1 technology priority for CIOs. The mega vendors such as Oracle, SAS, IBM etc., are already having major portion of the revenue with their packaged applications in these areas. It is estimated by Gartner that Analytics will be touching 75% of potential users by 2020. This is proven by the growth rate of new vendors such as QlickTech and Tableau by 45% (as per Gartner report). Cloud Storage: Cloud Storage, also referred as Data Storage as a Service, is...
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...Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles Enterprise Architecture Justification Paper Case Study Written by: June 14, 2000 IFSM 311 Professor To consider what enterprise architecture means, it is important to understand its origin. All architecture within information technology can track its ancestry back to the lessons learned from building architecture. Enterprise Architecture is the description and visualization of the structure, a blueprint if you will, of a given area of contemplation, its elements and their collaborations and interrelations links vision, strategy and feasibility, focusing on usability durability and effectiveness. Architecture enables construction, defining principles, rules, standards and guidelines, expressing and communicating a vision. This model will help any organization understand a proposed change in services or equipment it be integrated or changed within their environment. Enterprise architecture is designed to determine how an organization can achieve its current and future objectives in an efficient and effective manner. The architecture is separated into the business, application, and information viewpoints. The business viewpoint identifies the processes and standards that the business functions with every day. The application viewpoint describes the collaboration between different processes and standards used by the organization. The information viewpoint describes and assembles the raw data in the organization such as presentations...
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...terms of what type of application architecture they use. The first alternative in terms of application architecture is a client-based architecture. As it states that the downloaded tool will communicate with the DRUB server to select data and analyze, which is very similar to the client-based architecture where the clients tells the server what data to select and analyze and processes data will be sent back to the client for display. The second alternative in terms of application architecture is two-tier client-server architecture. The application logic can be partitioned between the client and the server. The server is responsible for the data and the client, the application and presentation. Using the web browser the client will talk to the web server using a standard called HTTP (Jerry Fitzgerald, 2009). B). Outline the pros and cons of the two alternatives and make a recommendation to Fred about which is better. Solution 1 Client-based architecture: Pros: 1. More inexpensive to implement as microcomputers are considerably cheaper versus mainframe. 2. Hardware of different manufactures or platforms can function together on the same network. Solution 1 Client-based architecture: Cons: 1. Data traffic must be sent and received between client and host. 2. Due to the potential amount of information that must be sent between client and host, this can put a significant performance hit against the network, affecting all machines. Solution 2: Thin-client pros: 1. Better...
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...Enterprise Architecture Program Key Initiative Overview ® Enterprise Architecture Program Key Initiative Overview Richard Buchanan Research Managing Vice President This overview provides a high-level description of the Enterprise Architecture Program Key Initiative. IT leaders can use this guide to understand what they need to do to prepare for this initiative. Analysis Enterprise architecture (EA) is a strategic planning process that translates an enterprise’s business vision and strategy into effective enterprise change. The EA program institutes a collaborative, shared planning process. EA teams work with business and IT stakeholders to define a future-state vision in terms of requirements, principles and models. They then compare the future-state vision to the current state, identify gaps and plan investments to fill them. EA is not IT-focused, but business-driven and comprehensive. The future-state vision helps coordinate the analysis of—and develop a plan to harmonize—required changes in business functions and processes, information and data provisioning, technology capabilities and application solutions. An effective EA program will help align IT investments with long-term strategy, reduce risk, deliver higher-quality information and engineer adaptive solutions and technical services. Consider these factors to determine your readiness EA planners must charter the program and ensure that senior leaders support it. They must also establish program...
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...Introduction Merging our company with The Wing Company to form Summit Solutions Corporation has brought about decisions regarding business information systems and what platforms would be the best suited for this organization. If this merger is to succeed, the organization needs to have a firm organizational strategic plan that will combine the strategies of both companies. The strategy will include how every person involved, in both organizations, will be affected, how the different platforms will work, and how these platforms can be brought together in order to reach our organization’s goals and objectives for future success. Additionally, the organization needs to have a decision processing system that will support the organization’s business processes, activities and tasks, how input and output data flows, business applications, and the organization’s technology infrastructure. In order to achieve this, the business objectives need to be defined, business workflow needs to be developed, development of system requirements, specification of the applications and data architectures, define information infrastructure, define information system program measures and metrics, and manage hardware and software integration. Three Characteristics of Enterprise Architecture Enterprise architecture is defined as the goals of the organization, how these goals will be realized from the business processes, and how these “business processes can be better served through technology”...
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...ARCHITECTS ARCHITECTURE OR USERS ARCHITECTURE The construction industry is based around projects. Each project is every time different and unique on its own design, management and construction. Nevertheless a project is not only made out of concrete, wood or any of the materials used on it, a project is a lot more and a lot deeper than that. It is not a quick sketch on a napkin. A project is influenced by its atmosphere which is the location, the client or the user, and even the contractor hired for the project. Architecture is influenced by anything happening around it, which is why it changes every time its atmosphere changes. Böhme states that to experience space in its complete entirety. By inhabiting space individuals can sense the character that surrounds them. Inhabitants sense its atmosphere. Photography, written articles and the interpretation of other viewers of a space cannot compare to individual experience and interaction in interior spaces. Recently this way of interaction has become an important discussion between architects and designers. The process of a project is not anymore unique, and it becomes something functional. It is thought that a template can be followed even when the client or the factors involving the project change every time. For example many architects choose the same sub-contractors for each project as they believe they are trustful and successful, even when the clients have their specific needs and vary...
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...21 principles of enterprise architecture for the financial sector Thiago Souza Mendes Guimarães (tmendesg@br.ibm.com ) IT Architect IBM China 20 November 2012 The article lists the most relevant architectural principles for an IT department to follow in the financial market, with details about each principle. These principles are essential for an IT department to take on a strategic role in the company and to indicate actual value generation in IT decisions within an environment where pressure and business decisions are critical. Structure of these principles This article was developed with the purpose of proposing certain principles that must drive an enterprise architecture initiative. The main motivation that led to the development of this list is the difficulty of implementing enterprise architecture in an environment as hostile as the financial market. There is great pressure on the technology segment, which is usually not perceived as strategic. An even greater challenge is showing that IT decisions can add value and differentials to businesses. This list was organized and developed based on the selection and adjustment of the most relevant principles established throughout my experience in the financial market. Despite being selected within the financial segment context, most of these principles apply to any type of industry after only a few minor adjustments. Definitions Principles are high-level definitions of fundamental values that guide...
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...CHAPTER 2: MINI-CASE I. DEALS-R-US BROKERS (PART 1) Question 1: Classify the two alternatives in terms of what type of application architecture they use. a. The first suggested solution is a client-based architecture since it’s the client that tells the server what data to select to analyze, making the client perform most of the work. b. The later architecture is two-tier Client-Server architecture since it requires an application layer, in this case, a web browser and all processing is done by the server. The server is responsible for the data and the client, the application and presentation. Using the web browser the client will talk to the web server using HTTP standard. Question 2: Outline the pros and cons of the two alternatives and make a recommendation to Fred about which is better. Solution 1: Client-based Pros 1. This method will be much more inexpensive to implement as micro-computers are considerably cheaper versus mainframe. 2. Hardware devices from different manufacturers/platforms can function together on the same network. Solution 1: Client-based Cons 1. Data always flows through the network between the client and the server. 2. So much data traffic on the network between client and host could put a significantly slow down the network thereby affecting performance and response time. Solution 2: Two-Tier Client-Server Pros 1. Performance in this method will be better as processing is distributed to multiple machines (in this case...
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...Fundamentals of Supply Chain Solutions with SAP Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is a framework for organizing, defining, and standardizing the business processes necessary to effectively plan and control an organization so the organization can use its internal knowledge to seek external advantage. The ERP system is a set of software applications that organize, define and standardize the business processes necessary to effectively plan and control an organization. Essentially, ERP applications are a computer model of a business, embodying the products and processes, information flow, procedures, and relationships between functions and activities. A set of planning applications can provide recommendations for what must be accomplished in order to meet the forecasted demand and keep the business functioning smoothly. Planning is at the core of ERP and is embodied in a top-down hierarchy of functions: master planning, detailed material and resource planning, and execution, such as production control and purchasing. Master planning is the executive level function that sets the operational business plan, supports the sales and operations planning (S&OP) process. Detailed material planning (Material Requirements Planning or MRP) uses bill of material and inventory information to develop a complete manufacturing and purchasing plan for all products, assemblies, components and materials. At this level capacity requirement planning (CRP) ties the...
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