Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
root
technical
knowledge
generalist
technical
knowledge
business,
application insight
process insight
psycho-social
skills
Gerrit Muller
Embedded Systems Institute
Den Dolech 2 (Laplace Building 0.10) P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlands
gerrit.muller@embeddedsystems.nl
Abstract
The typical phases of a system architect development are described, beginning at
the fundamental technology knowledge, with a later broadening in technology and
in business aspects. Finally the subtlety of individual human beings is taken into
account.
Distribution
This article or presentation is written as part of the Gaud project. The Gaud project philosophy is to improve
by obtaining frequent feedback. Frequent feedback is pursued by an open creation process. This document is
published as intermediate or nearly mature version to get feedback. Further distribution is allowed as long as the
document remains complete and unchanged.
All Gaud documents are available at:
http://www.gaudisite.nl/
version: 1.0
status: draft
Introduction
System architects are very rare commodity. This article describes the observed
general growth pattern of system architects. It is hoped that by analyzing the
characteristics of existing system architects the training of new system architects
will be facilitated. Reference [2] contains a good description of a system architect.
generalist
technical
knowledge
business,
application insight
process insight
psycho-social
skills
Most developers of complex high tech products are specialists. They need an indepth understanding of the applicable technology to effectively guide the product
Gerrit Muller
The Awakening of a System Architect
19th April 2006
version: 1.0
page: 1
specialist
depth of
knowledge
generalist
root
knowledge
Gerrit Muller
The Awakening of a System Architect
19th April 2006
version: 1.0
page: 2
breadth of
knowledge
specialist
specialist
specialist
specialist
specialist
specialist
specialist
depth of
knowledge
specialist
generalist
generalist
Figure 3: Generalists and Specialists are both needed in complex products, they
have complementary expertise
SW, mechanics or electronics architects
For instance a software architect needs a significant in-depth knowledge of software
engineering and technologies, in order to design the software architecture of the
entire system. On the other hand a subsystem architect requires multi-disciplinary
knowledge, however the limited scope reduces the required breadth to a hopefully
realistic level.
Many products are becoming so complex that a single architect is not capable of
covering the entire breadth of the required detailed knowledge areas. In those cases
a team of architects is required, that is complementing each other in knowledge and
skills. It is recommended that those architects have complementary roots as well;
as this will improve the credibility of the team of architects.
Acknowledgements
Chuck Kilmer suggested a new title and offered many textual improvements.
References
[1] Gerrit Muller.
The system architecture homepage.
gaudisite.nl/index.html, 1999.
http://www.
[2] Eberhardt Rechtin and Mark W. Maier. The Art of Systems Architecting. CRC
Press, Boca Raton, Florida, 1997.
Gerrit Muller
The Awakening of a System Architect
19th April 2006
version: 1.0
page: 3
all-round specialist
specialist
depth of
knowledge
breadth of
knowledge
system architect
aspect
architect
root
knowledge
Gerrit Muller
The Awakening of a System Architect
19th April 2006
version: 1.0
page: 4