Enterprise Architecture Blog - Comments

Brian Hopkins comments on Vive la différence...

Brian Hopkins — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:42:38 +0000

Love the quote - An architect as Tom states "faces towards strategy, structure and purpose, towards the abstract", the role is about ensuring we do the right thing. The designer "faces towards implementation and practice, towards the concrete", ensuring we do it right.

I've always been a "do the right thing" guy...guess that's why I ended up in EA.

Brian Hopkins comments on Picking up the pieces...

Brian Hopkins — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:40:46 +0000

Interesting observation and one I can second from personal experience. The pointed question is this, "where in the IT organization does data design live?" I've seen it moved about between development, business analysis and enterprise architecture. I posit that the best organizations realize data design is a separate animal and have a skilled and dedicated team that either 1) functions as a center of excellence supporting the overall delivery function or 2) directly handles the data design functions within a delivery framework.

Thanks for addressing this. Please join us in the Linked In Enterprise Architecture Network group / Practicing Enterprise Architecture subgroup if you'd like to pursue a discussion with some practicing EAs on what to do about this. I'd love to get other people's perspective and inputs.

Mark Ridgwell comments on Effective architecture diagrams

Mark Ridgwell — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:09:44 +0000

Thanks for this refreshing piece of common sense.

People have a tendency to over-complicate things don't they? Keeping it simple, speaking in a language that everyone understands is a key to project success.

Kind regards,
Mark

Ryan Schellenberg comments on How to write technical documentation...

Ryan Schellenberg — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 05:46:41 +0000

Very clever find. I love the way it builds from the very simple to the complex slowly, and, as you said, the audience has the opportunity to leave when they know enough.

TP comments on Vive la différence...

TP — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 01:02:29 +0000

I believe it will take a generation before the role of the Architect will break free from the traditional role of the senior developer. All to often architects continue to focus on implementation instead of planning for the future.

Martyn Richard Jones comments on What does a Chief Architect do next?

Martyn Richard Jones — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 11:24:52 +0000

Excellent article indeed. The issue of a career path out of architecture seems to occur with frequency these days, I suspect this is probably not so unrelated to the fact that many architects have very little business knowledge and are still confined to Java and a bit of database knowledge when it comes to real enterprise IT architectural know-how. I have carried out dual roles in the past, such as domain architect (usually for EDW/BI but also for STP etc.) and programme stream leadership / project management; I have designed and built a plethora of complex systems in my career, and I don't quite understand why someone who has that type of opportunity would opt to do something different, unless of course they don't like to do that, or, they are nor particularly good at it.

Jon Ayre comments on Enterprise Solution Architecture Decision Making

Jon Ayre — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 09:01:02 +0000

I can sympathise with your post, and it goes to the heart of the problem: Many businesses are more willing to trust outside suppliers who have a clear commercial advantage in providing biassed advice, over the considered, informed and independent advice of their Chief Architect. This approach is a complete nonsense, and questions whether businesses really understand what the purpose of their chief architect is. My advice to organisations: Trust YOUR experts, not THEIR experts, especially when they stand to profit from their advice.

Regards
The Enterprising Architect
http://theenterprisingarchitect.blogspot.com

Jon Ayre comments on Enterprise Architecture Pitfalls

Jon Ayre — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 08:54:43 +0000

I was involved in the twitter conversation on this matter, and have to agree with the overall sentiments. There is little or no value in a list of reasons for failure or things that are wrong, as these lists are generally uninformative, obvious, and potentially infinite in length. More useful are reports on how things should be done, rathen than how they should not.

Regards
The Enterprising Arcihitect
http://theenterprisingarchitect.blogspot.com

Mrsean2k comments on Enterprise Solution Architecture Decision Making

Mrsean2k — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 14:20:55 +0000

Nicely put, Alan.

Too many times "we" use the supposed expertise of others as a security blanket instead of taking the time to do due diligence. It's an easy political solution for the risk averse to effectively outsource difficult decisions and then live with the consequences as if it was inevitable. But those are just the sort of issues we're paid to force and challenge.

Glad it paid off so hansomely in this case, and couldn't agree more with the final conclusion.

Giovanni comments on SOA - food for thought...

Giovanni — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 20:15:16 +0000

While working with a client on Web Services APIs I asked about the rationale behind some decisions that involved putting far too much business logic on the WS accelarator. Silence is what I got then in inumerous situations.

I believe SOA implementations aren't being given too much thought. And that's bizarre because once people realize their APIs where misplaces/miscontructed/misaligned... they will want to fix that. And by that time, dozens of front end applications will be using them which will drive costs to the roof.

I think that's just evolution perhaps... but it could be avoided.