All the time I get the questions about how to do current state architecture or “as-is” architecture at executive briefings (EBC), at events or through our customers. Recently I was asked about this in regards to an effort a large enterprise that is undergoing an effort to map out what their current architecture...

I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine that resulted in some disagreements on root issues architects face. The topic of the Architect Nemesis came up. Where some of assertions were accurate it was still founded on a fundamental belief the we should correlate software architecture to...

As some of you may know I aided with the Application Architecture Guide 2.0 materials which will soon be a blue book this upcoming year. J.D. Meier who was the brains and the mass orchestrator of the guide has put together a great compile of his works over the past few years. Check it out. Guides Application...

I just published a new article on the Microsoft Enterprise Architecture Center entitled, A Pragmatic Approach to Describing Solution Architectures . In this article, we will explore how architectures traditionally have been designed and described. By understanding where we have come from, we then can...

There is a lot of EA events happening in the next few weeks. The Open Group is having an event that looks to be the most significant in years. They are launching two other practitioner conferences in conjunction with the architecture practitioner conference. The launch of the 1st security and enterprise...

Microsoft patterns & practices announced today the latest addition to the p&p library of software architecture guidance: Acceptance Test Engineering Guide (BETA 1)   Quick Links – Codeplex site: http://codeplex.com/TestingGuidance – Project announcement: http://www.codeplex.com...

This is a great web cast for all those infrastructure architects out there wondering what happens behind the scenes in gigantic data centers at Microsoft. These are the same data centers that surface all of the Microsoft Software + Services (S+S) and Live applications such as: Live Mail, Messenger, Office...

In a fairly recent whitepaper from IBM, global services did a worldwide survey across various roles to see how difficult it is to change an organizations behavior.  The article shows some solid numbers around the friction that exists when trying to change an organization. I talk about this quite...

There is a new architecture podcast out from IEEE that will be hosted by Grady Booch. If you do not know Grady he is recognized internationally as an industry luminary  for his innovative work on software architecture, software engineering, and modeling. He was chief scientist of Rational Software...

I ran across an interesting post on J.D. Meier's Blog that describes the Patterns & Practices project called the Application Architecture Guide Project 2.0 . Hosted on CodePlex.com this project aims to take guidance from Microsoft and marry it with the CodePlex community. In the projects own words...

Recently, I have had discussions with folks at Microsoft about Architecture Styles. This term has been used in the IT industry for a very long time. I think the earliest reference was in the early 80's. But that is neither here, nor there in my opinion. We have been using this concept for a long time...

Infoworld just published a great piece called Cloud computing may draw government action . The article goes into data privacy concerns with the cloud. They state that Cloud computing will soon become an area of hot debate in Washington, D.C., with policy makers debating issues such as the privacy and...

Douglas Purdy puts it best in his What is Oslo? post a few days ago, Oslo is a tool, a language and a repository. You are still probably scratching your head thinking, well what is it really? Well, the guys over in the connected systems division isn't ready to disclose all details until PDC. I think...

The Microsoft Consulting Services Infrastructure Architects have setup a new blog that walks through and announces upcoming web casts from their team. You can find the site at: http://blogs.technet.com/mcstalks/ In there words the site is set out to accomplish: The aim of each presentation is to share...

For those interested, the 2008 Microsoft Strategic Architect Forum (SAF) will happen again this year. Each year my team organizes this conference so that top architects from around the world can get together to collaborate on key challenges in the industry. This year, it will be held in downtown San...

In a recent article on Network World they highlight security issues with the cloud. Jon Brodkin extracts his thoughts from a Gartner report titled “ Assessing the Security Risks of Cloud Computing .” If you had seen my last post on Challenges moving to the Cloud you can see many synergies...

Many have asked for source code to the Loan Origination Reference Architecture and now it's on CodePlex. Source Code http://www.codeplex.com/los/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=15173 Home Page http://msdn.microsoft.com/architecture/orlos

Over the past month there has been a flurry of interest in what is referred to as the Enterprise Architecture Toolkit (EATK). The last mention of the EATK was in my post recapping the Japan Strategic Architecture Forum I mentioned the launch of the EATK. What is the EATK So what exactly is the EATK?...

I really enjoyed reading the " 10 Reasons Enterprises Aren’t Ready to Trust the Cloud " post from Stacey Higginbotham . She highlights some very important points in here analysis. She outlines the following challenges with the cloud: 1. It’s not secure. We live in an age in which...

  If you haven't heard or been to the Microsoft Architect Insight Conference your missing out. This is a great conference for architects. Whether your Microsoft specific or not. Topics range from process, tooling, business and IT strategy.  This year the conference was held in late April in...

At TechEd this year, Simon Guest, Senior Director of the Platform Architecture team was interviewed about what our team does, why it does it, who our customer is and how we deliver to the architecture community. If you are interested in learning more about what my team does for Microsoft check out the...

I haven't talked about these much but plan on it in the near future. I think there are some real good nuggets of guidance that can be learned from S+S Blueprints and Software Factories. Keep an eye out for some posts about how these relate to the architecture process and Enterprise Architecture in the...

Enterprise Library is a collection of application blocks intended for use by developers who build complex, enterprise-level applications. Enterprise Library is used when building applications that are typically to be deployed widely and to interoperate with other applications and systems. In addition...

If you are a SharePoint 2007 shop or thinking about becoming one check out this article on how a Microsoft Partner called Provoke built a custom metadata repository and surfaced it up through SharePoint. I see this method being a trend for enterprises as we start to mature in the practice of information...

      Claims Processing Reference Architecture Claims Processing Reference Architecture provides quality services in the field of Auto Insurance Claims Processing however these components can be leveraged for other forms of claims processing such as: Home, Medical, Mortgage, and other...