Continuous Architecture in Practice

Murat Erder has more than twenty-five years' experience in the software industry working for software vendors, management consultancies and large international banks. During his career Murat has had a variety of roles, from developer, to software architect, to management consultant. Murat's corporate IT roles cover the areas of data, integration, architecture and working as a CTO. He is co-author of the book Continuous Architecture: Sustainable Architecture in an Agile and Cloud-Centric World (2015) and has presented on this topic at a range of conferences, including SEI Saturn, O'Reilly Software Architecture and GOTOLondon.  Pierre Pureur is an experienced software architect, with extensive innovation and application development background, vast exposure to the financial services industry, broad consulting experience and comprehensive technology infrastructure knowledge. His past roles include serving as Chief Enterprise Architect for a major financial services company, leading large architecture teams, managing large-scale concurrent application development projects and directing innovation initiatives, as well as developing strategies and business plans. He is co-author of the book Continuous Architecture: Sustainable Architecture in an Agile and Cloud-Centric World (2015) and has published many articles and presented at range of software architecture conferences on this topic. Eoin Woods is the Chief Technology Officer of Endava, where he guides technical strategy, oversees capability development and directs investment in emerging technologies. Prior to joining Endava, Eoin worked in the software engineering industry for twenty years, developing system software products and complex applications in the capital markets domain. His main technical interests are software architecture, DevOps and software security and resilience. He is co-author of the book Software Systems Architecture (2012), is a frequent speaker at industry events and was the recipient of the 2018 Linda M. Northrup Award for Software Architecture, awarded by the SEI at Carnegie Mellon University.

" Continuous Architecture in Practice captures the key concerns of software architects today, including security, scalability and resilience, and provides valuable insights into managing emerging technologies such as machine/deep learning and blockchain. A recommended read!" --Jan Bosch, Professor of Software Engineering and Director of the Software Center at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden " Continuous Architecture in Practice is a great introduction to modern-day software architecture, explaining the importance of shifting architectural thinking 'left' in order to form a set of firm foundations for delivery and continuous architecture evolution. I really liked the coverage of quality attributes, with a real-world case study providing a way to highlight the real-world complexities of the trade-offs associated with different solutions. The set of references to other material is impressive too, making this book incredibly useful for readers new to the domain of software architecture." --Simon Brown, author of Software Architecture for Developers "In our ever-changing world of increasing system complexity, the responsibilities and skills required to be a software architect must continually evolve. Successfully adapting to constant requirements, technology, and business changes requires an architect to be multi-skilled, capable in engineering and technology, business and management. The role of architect has never been more challenging. "This is why Continuous Architecture in Practice is an important book for all architects to absorb. The principles-based approach espoused in this book can be used to guide architects in charting a successful path in a broad range of project contexts. The essential activities for software architects present an excellent overview of the core professional skills an agile architect must possess, regardless of the problem domain and technologies in use. "Most notably, the book devotes chapters to the key run-time quality attributes that drive modern systems. Security, performance, scalability, and resilience are the lifeblood of Internet-facing systems. Each chapter provides a contemporary overview of the characteristics of these quality attributes and explains tactics an architect can adopt to design and evolve systems that are built for long term survival. An additional chapter on data architectures recognizes an important system component that is rarely covered in architecture books. Data lies at the heart of most systems and creating resilient and scalable data architectures exploiting modern data technologies is a skill all architects should have. "Written in an approachable, concise, and informative style, with concepts illustrated using an ongoing case study, this is an excellent book that will help architects address the many challenges of engineering systems in the 2020s and beyond. It is a deep source of knowledge suitable for practicing and aspiring architects, and an advanced college course in software architecture. It will repay the time investment many times over." --Professor Ian Gorton, Northeastern University "Focus on software architecture can get lost when talking about agile software practices. However, the importance of architecture in software systems has always been and continues to be relevant. The authors address this important topic with their second book on Continuous Architecture. This time they provide advice on aspects that will make or break your system, from data to security, scalability and resilience. A much recommended book that offers practical guidance for anyone developing systems in today's rapidly evolving technology landscape." --Ivar Jacobson "This book continues the journey where its predecessor left off. Software today is never-ending, and true to its name, this book looks at continuing trends and applies Continuous Architecture principles using practical examples. The authors avoid the trap of picking popular tools whose relevance quickly expire, choosing instead to look at those trends that should influence and shape architecture decisions. This book will be essential reading for any person wanting to design and architect software systems that continue to keep up with the times." --Patrick Kua, CTO Coach and Mentor "In the two-decade-old conflict between 'big upfront design' and 'emergent architecture,' software architects have often had a hard time finding a meaningful compromise. In Continuous Architecture in Practice, Erder, Pureur, and Woods provide them with a proven path. This book is a big leap forward: I liked the more systematic use of architectural tactics--a design artifact that has not been exploited as much as it should. And that they brought the concept of architectural technical debt to a more prominent position in the process of making technical and managerial decisions." --Philippe Kruchten, software architect "It's high time that Agile architecture evolved from oxymoron to what it really needs to be, a lean, enabling practice that accelerates development and delivery of the next generation of resilient and scalable enterprise class systems. Continuous Architecture in Practice is another quantum step toward that goal and provides practical guidance toward creating designs that are responsive to changing requirements and technologies." --Dean Leffingwell, creator of SAFe

• Foreword by Vaughn Vernon, Series Editor xvForeword by Kurt Bittner xixIntroduction xxiAcknowledgments xxvAbout the Authors xxvii Chapter 1: Why Software Architecture Is More Important than Ever 1 What Do We Mean by Architecture? 1 Software Industry Today 3 Current Challenges with Software Architecture 5 Software Architecture in an (Increasingly) Agile World 8 Introducing Continuous Architecture 11 Applying Continuous Architecture 17 Introduction to the Case Study 19 Summary 22 Chapter 2: Architecture in Practice: Essential Activities 23 Essential Activities Overview 24 Architectural Decisions 26 Quality Attributes 32 Technical Debt 36 Feedback Loops: Evolving an Architecture 42 Common Themes in Today's Software Architecture Practice 48 Summary 54 Chapter 3: Data Architecture 55 Data as an Architectural Concern 56 Key Technology Trends 60 Additional Architectural Considerations 76 Summary 84 Further Reading 85 Chapter 4: Security as an Architectural Concern 87 Security in an Architectural Context 88 Architecting for Security 92 Architectural Tactics for Mitigation 101 Maintaining Security 115 Summary 119 Further Reading 119 Chapter 5: Scalability as an Architectural Concern 123 Scalability in the Architectural Context 124 Architecting for Scalability: Architecture Tactics 134 Summary 155 Further Reading 156 Chapter 6: Performance as an Architectural Concern 159 Performance in the Architectural Context 159 Architecting for Performance 163 Summary 183 Further Reading 184 Chapter 7: Resilience as an Architectural Concern 187 Resilience in an Architectural Context 188 Architecting for Resilience 195 Architectural Tactics for Resilience 200 Maintaining Resilience 216 Summary 222 Further Reading 223 Chapter 8: Software Architecture and Emerging Technologies 225 Using Architecture to Deal with Technical Risk Introduced by New Technologies 226 Introduction to Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Deep Learning 227 Using Machine Learning for TFX 230 Using a Shared Ledger for TFX 246 Summary 257 Further Reading 258 Chapter 9: Conclusion 259 What Changed and What Remained the Same? 259 Updating Architecture Practice 261 Data 263 Key Quality Attributes 264 The Architect in the Modern Era 267 Putting Continuous Architecture in Practice 268 Appendix A: Case Study 269Appendix B: Comparison of Technical Implementations of Shared Ledgers 299 Glossary 301Index 311