Software Architecture or Component Frameworks? Alexander L. Wolf University of Colorado at Boulder

What Have You Done for Me Lately? u Software architecture –prototype formal notations –prototype design environments –assessment practices u Component frameworks –inherently support distributed systems –compatible with popular OO methods –supported by commercial products u The “charitable” view –Component frameworks support only a specific architecture –Software architecture technology seeks to be general

Component Frameworks are Here Today From: “Experience with Software Architectures and Configured Software Descriptions” by Walt Scacchi, University of California, Irvine James S. Choi, California State University, Fullerton

Architecture vs. Component Frameworks u Reduced risk? u Predictability of scalability, reliability, deployability, maintainability? u Skill value? u Market interest?

One Attempt at Relating the Two Comp Middleware OS + NetworkOS + N Middleware 1 OS + Network OS + N Connector Middleware 2 Connector Comp Connector Process Boundaries Architectural Style? Architectural Style Process Boundaries From: “The Role of Middleware in Software Architectures” by Eric Dashofy, University of California, Irvine

Some Challenge Problems u Capturing and supporting a component framework as an architectural style u Modeling and analyzing component frameworks as software architectures u Providing a rigorous method to choose among alternative component frameworks (as architectures, not as products) u Showing how to integrate some software architecture technology into an existing component framework support system