Chapter 6 Architectural Design 1

Chapter 6 – Architectural Design
Lecture 1
Chapter 6 Architectural design 1

Topics covered
 Architectural design decisions

 Architectural views
 Architectural patterns
 Application architectures

Software architecture
 The design process for identifying the sub-systems

making up a system and the framework for sub-system
control and communication is architectural design.
 The output of this design process is a description of the

software architecture.

Architectural design
 An early stage of the system design process.

 Represents the link between specification and design
processes.
 The most important part of design. critically important
 Unifies oth types of design (coming)
 Often carried out in parallel with some specification
activities.
 It involves identifying major system components and
their communications.

The architecture of a packing robot control
system

Architectural abstraction
 Architecture in the small is concerned with the

architecture of individual programs.
 At this level, we are concerned with the way that an
individual program is decomposed into components.
 Architecture in the large is concerned with the

architecture of complex enterprise systems that include
other systems, programs, and program components.
These enterprise systems are distributed over different
computers, which may be owned and managed by
different companies.

Architectural representations
 ==> Simple, informal block diagrams showing entities

and relationships are the most frequently used method
for documenting software architectures.
 But these have been criticized because they lack
semantics, do not show the types of relationships
between entities nor the visible properties of entities in
the architecture.
 Depends on the use of architectural models.The
requirements for model semantics depends on how the
models are used.

Use of architectural models
 As a way of facilitating discussion about the system design

 A high-level architectural view of a system is useful for
communication with system stakeholders and project planning
because it is not cluttered with detail.
 Stakeholders can relate to it and understand an abstract view of the
systemt
 They can then discuss the system as a whole without being
confused by detail.
 As a way of documenting an architecture that has been
designed
 The aim here is to produce a complete system model that shows the
different components in a system, their interfaces and their
connections.

Architectural design decisions
 Architectural design is a creative process so the process

differs depending on the type of system being
developed.
 However, a number of common decisions span all

design processes and these decisions affect the non-
functional characteristics of the system.

Architectural design decisions
 Is there a generic application architecture that can be

used?
 How will the system be distributed?
 What architectural styles are appropriate?
 What approach will be used to structure the system?
 How will the system be decomposed into modules?
 What control strategy should be used?
 How will the architectural design be evaluated?
 How should the architecture be documented?

Architecture reuse
 Systems in the same domain often have similar

architectures that reflect domain concepts.
 Application product lines are built around a core architecture

with variants that satisfy particular customer requirements.
 The architecture of a system may be designed around one

of more architectural patterns or ‘styles’.
 These capture the essence of an architecture and can be
instantiated in different ways.
 Discussed later in this lecture.

Architecture and system characteristics
 Performance
 Localize critical operations and minimize communications. Use large
rather than fine-grain components.
 Security
 Use a layered architecture with critical assets in the inner layers.
 Safety
 Localize safety-critical features in a small number of sub-systems.
 Availability
 Include redundant components and mechanisms for fault tolerance.
 Maintainability
 Use fine-grain, replaceable components.

Architectural views
 What views or perspectives are useful when designing

and documenting a system’s architecture?
 What notations should be used for describing
architectural models?
 Each architectural model only shows one view or
perspective of the system.
 It might show how a system is decomposed into modules, how
the run-time processes interact or the different ways in which
system components are distributed across a network. For both
design and documentation, you usually need to present multiple
views of the software architecture.

4 + 1 view model of software architecture
 A logical view, which shows the key abstractions in the

system as objects or object classes.
 A process view, which shows how, at run-time, the
system is composed of interacting processes.
 A development view, which shows how the software is
decomposed for development.
 A physical view, which shows the system hardware and
how software components are distributed across the
processors in the system.
 Related using use cases or scenarios (+1)

Architectural patterns
 Patterns are a means of representing, sharing and reusing

knowledge.
 An architectural pattern is a stylized description of good

design practice, which has been tried and tested in different
environments.
 Patterns should include information about when they are and

when the are not useful.
 Patterns may be represented using tabular and graphical

descriptions.
The Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern
Name MVC (Model-View-Controller)
Description Separates presentation and interaction from the system data. The system
is structured into three logical components that interact with each other.
The Model component manages the system data and associated
operations on that data. The View component defines and manages how
the data is presented to the user. The Controller component manages
user interaction (e.g., key presses, mouse clicks, etc.) and passes these
interactions to the View and the Model. See Figure 6.3.
Example Figure 6.4 shows the architecture of a web-based application system
organized using the MVC pattern.
When used Used when there are multiple ways to view and interact with data. Also
used when the future requirements for interaction and presentation of
data are unknown.
Advantages Allows the data to change independently of its representation and vice
versa. Supports presentation of the same data in different ways with
changes made in one representation shown in all of them.
Disadvantages Can involve additional code and code complexity when the data model
and interactions are simple.

The organization of the Model-View-Controller

Web application architecture using the MVC
pattern

Layered architecture
 Used to model the interfacing of sub-systems.

 Organizes the system into a set of layers (or abstract
machines) each of which provide a set of services.
 Supports the incremental development of sub-systems in
different layers. When a layer interface changes, only the
adjacent layer is affected.
 However, often artificial to structure systems in this way.

The Layered architecture pattern
Name Layered architecture
Description Organizes the system into layers with related functionality associated
with each layer. A layer provides services to the layer above it so the
lowest-level layers represent core services that are likely to be used
throughout the system. See Figure 6.6.
Example A layered model of a system for sharing copyright documents held in
different libraries, as shown in Figure 6.7.
When used Used when building new facilities on top of existing systems; when
the development is spread across several teams with each team
responsibility for a layer of functionality; when there is a requirement
for multi-level security.
Advantages Allows replacement of entire layers so long as the interface is
maintained. Redundant facilities (e.g., authentication) can be provided
in each layer to increase the dependability of the system.
Disadvantages In practice, providing a clean separation between layers is often

difficult and a high-level layer may have to interact directly with lower-
level layers rather than through the layer immediately below it.
Performance can be a problem because of multiple levels of
• A generic layered architecture

The architecture of the LIBSYS system

Key points
 A software architecture is a description of how a software

system is organized.
 Architectural design decisions include decisions on the type
of application, the distribution of the system, the
architectural styles to be used.
 Architectures may be documented from several different
perspectives or views such as a conceptual view, a logical
view, a process view, and a development view.
 Architectural patterns are a means of reusing knowledge
about generic system architectures. They describe the
architecture, explain when it may be used and describe its
advantages and disadvantages.

Chapter 6 – Architectural Design
Lecture 2

1. Repository architecture
 Sub-systems must exchange data. This may be done in

two ways:
 Shared data is held in a central database or repository and may
be accessed by all sub-systems;
 Each sub-system maintains its own database and passes data
explicitly to other sub-systems.
 When large amounts of data are to be shared, the
repository model of sharing is most commonly used a this
is an efficient data sharing mechanism.

The Repository pattern
Name Repository
Description All data in a system is managed in a central repository that

is accessible to all system components. Components do
not interact directly, only through the repository.
Example Figure 6.9 is an example of an IDE where the components

use a repository of system design information. Each
software tool generates information which is then available
for use by other tools.
When used You should use this pattern when you have a system in
which large volumes of information are generated that has
to be stored for a long time. You may also use it in data-
driven systems where the inclusion of data in the
repository triggers an action or tool.
Advantages Components can be independent—they do not need to
know of the existence of other components. Changes made
by one component can be propagated to all components.
All data can be managed consistently (e.g., backups done
at the same time) as it is all in one place.
Disadvantages The repository is a single point of failure so problems in the
repository affect the whole system. May be inefficiencies in
organizing all communication through the repository.
A repository architecture for an IDE

2. Client-server architecture
 Distributed system model which shows how data and

processing is distributed across a range of components.
 Can be implemented on a single computer.
 Set of stand-alone servers which provide specific
services such as printing, data management, etc.
 Set of clients which call on these services.
 Network which allows clients to access servers.

The Client–server pattern
Name Client-server
Description In a client–server architecture, the functionality of the system is

organized into services, with each service delivered from a
separate server. Clients are users of these services and access
servers to make use of them.
Example Figure 6.11 is an example of a film and video/DVD library
organized as a client–server system.
When used Used when data in a shared database has to be accessed from a
range of locations. Because servers can be replicated, may also
be used when the load on a system is variable.
Advantages The principal advantage of this model is that servers can be
distributed across a network. General functionality (e.g., a
printing service) can be available to all clients and does not
need to be implemented by all services.
Disadvantages Each service is a single point of failure so susceptible to denial
of service attacks or server failure. Performance may be
unpredictable because it depends on the network as well as the
system. May be management problems if servers are owned by
different organizations.
A client–server architecture for a film library

3. Pipe and filter architecture
 Functional transformations process their inputs to

produce outputs.
 May be referred to as a pipe and filter model (as in UNIX
shell).
 Variants of this approach are very common. When

transformations are sequential, this is a batch sequential
model which is extensively used in data processing
systems.
 Not really suitable for interactive systems.

The pipe and filter pattern
Name Pipe and filter
Description The processing of the data in a system is organized so that each

processing component (filter) is discrete and carries out one type
of data transformation. The data flows (as in a pipe) from one
component to another for processing.
Example Figure 6.13 is an example of a pipe and filter system used for
processing invoices.
When used Commonly used in data processing applications (both batch- and
transaction-based) where inputs are processed in separate stages
to generate related outputs.
Advantages Easy to understand and supports transformation reuse. Workflow
style matches the structure of many business processes. Evolution
by adding transformations is straightforward. Can be implemented
as either a sequential or concurrent system.
Disadvantages The format for data transfer has to be agreed upon between
communicating transformations. Each transformation must parse
its input and unparse its output to the agreed form. This increases
system overhead and may mean that it is impossible to reuse
functional transformations that use incompatible data structures.
An example of the pipe and filter architecture

3. Application architectures
 Application systems are designed to meet an

organizational need.
 As businesses have much in common, their application
systems also tend to have a common architecture that
reflects the application requirements.
 A generic application architecture is an architecture for a
type of software system that may be configured and
adapted to create a system that meets specific
requirements.

Use of application architectures
 As a starting point for architectural design.

 As a design checklist.
 As a way of organizing the work of the development
team.
 As a means of assessing components for reuse.
 As a vocabulary for talking about application types.

Examples of application types
 Data processing applications

 Data driven applications that process data in batches without
explicit user intervention during the processing.
 Transaction processing applications
 Data-centered applications that process user requests and
update information in a system database.
 Event processing systems
 Applications where system actions depend on interpreting events
from the system’s environment.
 Language processing systems
 Applications where the users’ intentions are specified in a formal
language that is processed and interpreted by the system.

Application type examples
 Focus here is on transaction processing and language

processing systems.
 Will look at two types....
 Transaction processing systems

 E-commerce systems;
 Reservation systems.
 Language processing systems
 Compilers;
 Command interpreters.

3a. Transaction processing systems
 Process user requests for information from a database or

requests to update the database.
 From a user perspective a transaction is:
 Any coherent sequence of operations that satisfies a goal;
 For example - find the times of flights from London to Paris.
 Users make asynchronous requests for service which are
then processed by a transaction manager.

The structure of transaction processing
applications

The software architecture of an ATM system

Information systems architecture
 Information systems have a generic architecture that can

be organized as a layered architecture.
 These are transaction-based systems as interaction
with these systems generally involves database
transactions.
 Layers include:
 The user interface
 User communications
 Information retrieval
 System database

Layered information system architecture

The architecture of the MHC-PMS

3b. Language processing systems
 Accept a natural or artificial language as input and generate

some other representation of that language.
 May include an interpreter to act on the instructions in the
language that is being processed.
 Used in situations where the easiest way to solve a problem
is to describe an algorithm or describe the system data
 Meta-case tools process tool descriptions, method rules, etc
and generate tools.

The architecture of a language processing
system

Compiler components
 A lexical analyzer, which takes input language tokens and

converts them to an internal form.
 A symbol table, which holds information about the names
of entities (variables, class names, object names, etc.)
used in the text that is being translated.
 A syntax analyzer, which checks the syntax of the
language being translated.
 A syntax tree, which is an internal structure representing
the program being compiled.

Compiler components
 A semantic analyzer that uses information from the

syntax tree and the symbol table to check the semantic
correctness of the input language text.
 A code generator that ‘walks’ the syntax tree and
generates abstract machine code.

A pipe and filter compiler architecture

A repository architecture for a language
processing system

Key points
 Models of application systems architectures help us

understand and compare applications, validate
application system designs and assess large-scale
components for reuse.
 Transaction processing systems are interactive systems
that allow information in a database to be remotely
accessed and modified by a number of users.
 Language processing systems are used to translate texts
from one language into another and to carry out the
instructions specified in the input language. They include
a translator and an abstract machine that executes the
generated language.

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Chapter 6 – Architectural Design

Chapter 6 Architectural design 1

 Architectural design decisions

Chapter 6 Architectural design 2

 The design process for identifying the sub-systems

 The output of this design process is a description of the

Chapter 6 Architectural design 3

 An early stage of the system design process.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 4

Chapter 6 Architectural design 5

 Architecture in the small is concerned with the

 Architecture in the large is concerned with the

Chapter 6 Architectural design 6

 ==> Simple, informal block diagrams showing entities

Chapter 6 Architectural design 7

 As a way of facilitating discussion about the system design

Chapter 6 Architectural design 8

 Architectural design is a creative process so the process

 However, a number of common decisions span all

Chapter 6 Architectural design 9

 Is there a generic application architecture that can be

Chapter 6 Architectural design 10

 Systems in the same domain often have similar

 Application product lines are built around a core architecture

 The architecture of a system may be designed around one

Chapter 6 Architectural design 11

Chapter 6 Architectural design 12

 What views or perspectives are useful when designing

Chapter 6 Architectural design 13

 A logical view, which shows the key abstractions in the

Chapter 6 Architectural design 14

 Patterns are a means of representing, sharing and reusing

 An architectural pattern is a stylized description of good

 Patterns should include information about when they are and

 Patterns may be represented using tabular and graphical

Name MVC (Model-View-Controller)

Chapter 6 Architectural design 16

Chapter 6 Architectural design 17

Chapter 6 Architectural design 18

 Used to model the interfacing of sub-systems.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 19

Name Layered architecture

Disadvantages In practice, providing a clean separation between layers is often

Chapter 6 Architectural design 21

Chapter 6 Architectural design 22

 A software architecture is a description of how a software

Chapter 6 Architectural design 23

Chapter 6 Architectural design 24

 Sub-systems must exchange data. This may be done in

Chapter 6 Architectural design 25

Description All data in a system is managed in a central repository that

Example Figure 6.9 is an example of an IDE where the components

Chapter 6 Architectural design 27

 Distributed system model which shows how data and

Chapter 6 Architectural design 28

Description In a client–server architecture, the functionality of the system is

Chapter 6 Architectural design 30

 Functional transformations process their inputs to