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Based on 8 reviews. Write
a review.
A Game of Two Halves, March 18, 2001Unfortunately, the other half of the book is less useful. The technical parts are either too simplistic, or too detailed when discussing a particular solution favoured by the authors. The text frequently tends to become a repetitive and thinly-disguised commercial for CORBA, and there is an obsession with standards such as RM-ODP which are simply not relevant to a great many commercial developers. The few examples are very simplistic, with no real discussion of many of the technical issues which a real architecture must address.
The book would have been much better for more care in its editing and presentation. The quality of proof-reading is in general poor, but becomes quite appalling in some of the technical sections - evidence perhaps that the authors allowed their technical stance to dictate a poor choice of word processor. The choice of diagrams seems random: some are good, but some difficult discussions cry out for a diagram (horizontal and vertical partitioning, for example), while in other places a diagram confuses where the text is clear. The reference list is incomplete, omitting even the authors' "primary" reference which is quoted, frequently, in the text. All this is doubly disappointing when you consider that one of the authors is the series editor, and both were co-authors of the excellent "AntiPatterns" book.
My advice: if you are happy with the
technological side of software architecture, and want advice on how to be a
better architect, then buy this book, but read chapters 5 through 9 before
you even attempt to read the first part. If, however, you are seeking
technical guidance in the real world of software from Microsoft, Oracle and
a host of legacy systems, then look elsewhere.
Based on 8 reviews. Write
a review.
Practical, readable, excellent, November 28, 2000Two of their best insights for me:
* Architecture affects the organization of the company/business unit. (In my company, we didn't realize this and we failed to create an organization that could support the architecture.)
* Virtually any architecture can accomplish the functional needs of a system - what differentiates architectures are how they provide the essential qualities (performance, modifiability, maintainibility, etc.) to the product.
The book is strongly based in the real-world, with practical examples. I never felt they were straying into "theorectical" land.
I also bought "Applied Software Architecture" but didn't like it
nearly as much - I highly recommend "Software Architecture in
Practice"!
Close, but no UML, October 10, 1999
Reviewer: A reader from Exit 8A, New Jersey
The book is basically good. SAAM is useful. However, I am at a loss to
understand why the authors have chosen to totally ignore UML, which is (and
was at the time of publication) the de facto standard for representing
software architecture. They have instead represented architectures in their
own non-standard, which the reader is forced to learn to understand their
diagrams.
UML is now as fundamental a piece of knowledge to the software architect as schematics are to the electrical engineer, and for the same reason - it is a common language of discourse, and is supported by the available tools. I urge the authors to publish a second edition with UML substituted for the ad-hoc diagrams.
Based on 3 reviews.
Good in essence, lower in form, December 4, 2000
Based on 10 reviews.
Reviewer: Jonathan Scarborough (see more about me) from San Francisco, California
Many of the principles discussed in the book are either common-sense best practices, or have been covered by other authors in the past. This book, however, ties together a wide range of process and architectural concepts into a complete blueprint for creating a rapid component and application development "factory".
As the authors point out repeatedly throughout the book, many of their requirements for a true component factory do not yet exist in commercially available products. However all their recommendations have been derived from the real-world experience of Peter Herzum and his team creating such a factory. Most of the material is highly applicable today, and it also provides a glimpse into what the rapid development of business systems will be like as the technological infrastructure matures over the next decade.
This book has already had a profound impact on my thinking regarding large scale business systems development, and I know that I will be referring to it for years to come.
The bottom line - if you're interested or involved in component-based development, read this book!
Dispelling Myths, Doing it Right, August 1, 2000
Reviewer: James
R. McElroy (see more about me) from Magalia, CA USA
As an OO practitioner and methodologist for the last 10 years, I found the
Herzum / Sims book to be right on the money in several regards.
OO has a lot of theoretical ideas which just don't seem to pan out in practice. The Business Component Factory cleary explains why, and shows what really works in the true industrial setting. It is rich in practical advise, and low in BS. Very refreshing for the software practitioner who is frustrated by the OO theoreticians who spout their wisdom from the ivory towers, but have rarely, if ever, had to work on real projects.
Along these lines, the BCF book dispels the OO myth that all classes / objects must be as intelligent as possible, and admits that, in reality, it is often best to have "focus" classes. These classes contain the intelligence of a group of related classes (grouped in a component) and give the advantage of lower coupling for the other classes, and of providing a focus target for process and use case modeling. Hence, Herzum / Sims tie the use case models effectively to classes, then to components.
The BCF book also points out that components need to be "first class citizens" in the UML metamodel, which map from analysis through design into code. As the UML currently stands, packages and (UML-style) components fail miserably in this area. Herzum / Sims show how to get around this deficiency and model and produce large-scale software units (components) effectively.
There is much more to the book than described above, but the above two points emphasize that the BCF book is not afraid to take on conventional wisdom (even the sacred UML), to point out flaws in this "wisdom", and to discuss what really works. Highly recommended, especially for anyone working on large-scale system development.
One of the most important books I've read in the last 10 yea, March 22,
2000
Reviewer: Jonathan
Scarborough (see more about me) from San
Francisco, California
There are a lot of books out there that discuss component-based development, but
this is the first book I've read that details a complete methodology for making
CBD work in the real world.
Many of the principles discussed in the book are either common-sense best practices, or have been covered by other authors in the past. This book, however, ties together a wide range of process and architectural concepts into a complete blueprint for creating a rapid component and application development "factory".
As the authors point out repeatedly throughout the book, many of their requirements for a true component factory do not yet exist in commercially available products. However all their recommendations have been derived from the real-world experience of Peter Herzum and his team creating such a factory. Most of the material is highly applicable today, and it also provides a glimpse into what the rapid development of business systems will be like as the technological infrastructure matures over the next decade.
This book has already had a profound impact on my thinking regarding large scale business systems development, and I know that I will be referring to it for years to come.
The bottom line - if you're interested or involved in component-based development, read this book!
Based on 9 reviews.
Based on 1 review. Write
a review.
Reviewer: Mike Tarrani (see more about me) from Tustin, CA USA
This book provides an interesting and comprehensive approach to designing software architectures. The author crystalized four concepts that have greatly influenced on my thinking: (1)focus on quality attributes during the design and evaluation, (2) a rich set of evaluation techniques, (3) dimensional views of the architecture design, and (4) a realistic approach to reusability.The author's treatment of quality attributes provides a good foundation for the design process. The author's method of linking quality attributes to quality requirements is plain good practice and bears careful reading. Traceability in any engineering or design effort is essential and the approach proposed needs to be included early in the life cycle.
There are major four evaluation techniques covered in the book: Scenario-based that examines software qualities within the context of scenarios; simulation techniques that model the architecture in a simulation environment; mathematical modeling that uses statistics, probability and other techniques to predict qualities such as reliability, etc.; and experienced-based reasoning (see Brooks' Mythical Man Month for a good explanation of that!).
Among the most powerful concepts presented is dimensional views, which decompose the architecture into component and system views; business, organization, process and technology views; and development, usage and evolution views. This approach ensures that an architecture's design proceeds in accordance with findings from a thorough analysis, and that all factors be considered and incorporated into the design. If you are a proponent of SEI's Architecture Trade-off Analysis Method (ATAM) you will see some similarities. However, if you carefully examine the author's approach you will see some gaps: the focus is not on trade-off points (although the dimensional views will certainly uncover trade-offs that have to be made), and ATAM does not address the evolution of the architecture. The product line approach proposed by the author does. Applying product line concepts to design and development promotes reusability, as well as providing a set of guidelines for evolving or changing the architecture.
Overall this is an excellent book that balances theory with a practical approach that is supported by case studies and real examples. I view it as a philosophy on architecture design instead of a methodology. It is a refreshing change from some of the architecture books I have read that are filled with dogmatic methods and "design in a vacuum". The approach proposed will link design to requirements, and will ensure that the architecture meets standards that are defined by quality attributes and not arbitrary design criteria.
Reviewer: Adam Rutkowski (see more about me) from Sydney, Australia
This is a book more about object-oriented design then UML. The first section covers the absolute basics of what OOD is. The middle portion teaches the reader how to use UML to depict their designs. The final section is a set of instructive essays, warning the reader of the problems and pitfalls that often occur in OOD, and how to avoid them.Page-Jones has an excellent sense of humour, and his engaging style makes this an incredibly enjoyable book to read. You won't even notice that you're actually learning something! I also like the fact that he doesn't use a single programming language for his examples, instead trying to be generic, or alternatively, giving examples from C++, Java, Eiffel, and Smalltalk in turn. This makes the book accessible for all OO designers.
I wouldn't recommend this book to an experienced OO designer who wishes to learn UML. That's not the intended audience. For a new comer, who wishes to learn good design techniques from the start, this is the book for you.
don't buy this book if you are a professional OO-Developer, February 15, 2001
Reviewer: A reader from Berlin, Germany
Probably I should have paid more attention at the word "fundamentals" in the title, before buying this book.The book contains a pretty basic and superficial overview of UML (Part 2), stuffed in the middle of an introduction to OOD/OOP (Part 1), and a description of good OOP principles (Part 3).
Skipping preambles, jokes, and trivial examples, the juicy information about UML can be read through in a couple of hours.
If you are familiar with OOP and you just need a professional tutorial on the UML formalism, you'd better look fo another book.
Software
Architecture, Frameworks & Components: A list by Mike Tarrani,
Consultant
(12 item list)
Object-based
programming, UML and RUP: A list by Jean-Franзois Groff, Software
guru
(9 item list)
Object
Oriented Design and Analysis: A list by Janelle Jowsey, Software
Developer
(12 item list)
Software
Architecture: A list by Eoin Woods, Software Architect
(6 item list)
Requirements,
Analysis, Design: A list by thomasvollmer, Software Developer
(5 item list)
Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture, Volume 1- A System of Patterns
Pattern-Oriented
Software Architecture, Volume 2: Patterns for Concurrent and Networked Objects
by Douglas Schmidt, et al
(Hardcover)
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