9:30am Morning Tea provided in 4th floor tearoom (Room 423, GP South)

ACCS and ITEE:SSE Special SEMINAR:Visiting Speaker

Place: Room 420, GP South (Building 78)
Time: Friday 16 Feb 2007, 10:00am Seminar

Host: Lars Grunske

Speaker: Len Bass, Carnegie Melon University, USA

Title:  The Architectural Expert (ArchE) tool

Abstract: The Architecture Expert (ArchE) tool is an assistant to the architect. It embodies quality attribute theories, techniques for ascertaining the appropriate quality attribute model from an architectural description, techniques for solving the quality attribute model to determine a predicted response in given situations, and the ability to use legacy designs as input. A sample interaction with an architect might be:

- The architect inputs features that need to be computed by the system being designed.
- A pre-specified portion of the design such as use of specific components.
- Quality attribute requirements specified as scenarios.

ArchE asks for information necessary to determine quality attribute behaviour such as execution time for various features, cost of change of various features. ArchE -

(a) Proposes a design,
(b) Identifies quality attribute scenarios that are not achieved with that design,
(c) Presents a list of tactics that might improve the design, such as insert an intermediary to improve the modifiability in a certain area, or introduce concurrency in a particular area to improve modifiability.

The architect chooses one or more tactics and ArchE applies these tactics to produce a new proposed design. The architect then may need to provide additional information to the new design, such as a meaningful name for a common service, or computation time for an intermediary. This process re-occurs until either:

(a) The quality attribute requirements are met; or
(b) The architect is happy with the result; or
(c) ArchE has no more proposals.

ArchE currently has quality attribute knowledge of real time, performance, modifiability, and variability. ArchE currently also has the ability to use legacy designs or portions of legacy designs as inputs.

Speaker Bio:
Len Bass has written two award-winning books in software architecture as well as several other books and numerous papers in a wide variety of areas of computer science and software engineering. He has been a keynote speaker or a distinguished lecturer on six continents. He is currently working on techniques for the methodical design of software architectures, to understand how to support usability through software architecture, and to understand the relationship between software architecture and global software development practices. He has been involved in the development of numerous different production or research software systems ranging from operating systems to database management systems to automotive systems.