Chapter 6 – Architectural Design

Lecture 1

Chapter 6 Architectural design 1

Topics covered

 Architectural design decisions

 Architectural views
 Architectural patterns
 Application architectures

Chapter 6 Architectural design 2

Software architecture Definition

 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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 3

The architecture of a packing robot control
system – Box and Line Diagram

Chapter 6 Architectural design 4

Architectural design decisions – common
questions (though a creative process)

 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?

Chapter 6 Architectural design 5

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 6

Architecture and system characteristics

 Performance
 Localise critical operations and minimise communications. Use large
rather than fine-grain components or replicate.
 Security
 Use a layered architecture with critical assets in the inner layers.
 Safety
 Localise 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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 7

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)

Chapter 6 Architectural design 8

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 9

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 10

The organization of the Model-View-Controller

Chapter 6 Architectural design 11

Web application architecture using the MVC
pattern

Chapter 6 Architectural design 12

Layered architecture

 Used to model the interfacing of sub-systems.

 Organises 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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 13

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.
Chapter 6 Architectural design 14
Performance can be a problem because of multiple
A generic layered architecture

Chapter 6 Architectural design 15

The architecture of the LIBSYS system

Chapter 6 Architectural design 16

Layered information system architecture

Chapter 6 Architectural design 17

The architecture of the MHC-PMS

Chapter 6 Architectural design 18

Generic Architecture Models

 Repository
 Client Server
 Pipe and Filter

Chapter 6 Architectural design 19

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 20

The Repository Architecture 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.
Disadvantage The repository is a single point of failure so
s problems in the repository affect the whole
Chapter 6 Architectural design 21
system. May be inefficiencies in organizing all
A repository architecture for an IDE

Chapter 6 Architectural design 22

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 23

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.
Chapter 6 Architectural design 24
A client–server architecture for a film library

Chapter 6 Architectural design 25

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.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 26

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.
Disadvantage The format for data transfer has to be agreed upon
s 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. Chapter 6 Architectural design 27
An example of the pipe and filter architecture

Chapter 6 Architectural design 28

Application architectures

 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.
 As a starting point for architectural design.
 As a design checklist.
 As a way of organising the work of the development team.
 As a means of assessing components for reuse.
 As a vocabulary for talking about application types.

Chapter 6 Architectural design 29

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-centred 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.
Chapter 6 Architectural design 30
Summary

 Architectural design decisions

 Pattern or Application; Distribution of responsibilities;
Control strategy; Modules; How to model
 Architectural views
 Logical, process, development, physical + use cases
 Architectural patterns
 MVC, Layered,
 Application architectures
 Repository, client-server, pipe and filter

Chapter 6 Architectural design 31