Abstract

Architectural design comprises the design decisions that should be made early in the project, but which can also be addressed throughout the project life cycle through iterative redesign. This entry focuses primarily on architectural design and not redesign, though many of the principles are shared. In general, architecture includes the organizing principles of the system, its structure, and how the desired qualities or properties of the system will be met, especially for emergent properties and those that require consideration of design trade-offs. It also includes defining the behavior of the system at its boundaries. The activities of architectural design are to define the problem, create and refine solutions, assess candidate solutions, and document the resulting design.