Ron Jacobs, Microsoft, Architect Evangelist

http:// arcast.net (or) www.arcast.tv for video
http://ronjacobs.com

- What is the role of the architect?
- What is software architecture?
- Do I want to become an architect?

- Architecture as a profession
 - 1857, New York, 13 powerful man wanted to elevate architecture to a profession

- The role of the architect
 - Explorer: Colombo. The silk road has gone and there was a need to get goods from the East. Columbus was an optimist. He estimated the distance to get there by a factor of minus 5. He also believed he established a route to Asia but he really got a route to America
 - Architects must help business find technological solutions to pressing problems
 - Explorers are visionary, persuasive and accountable
 - What are the top 3 new technology trends that will impact your organization in the next 2 years?
 - How could these trends be used as a competitive advantage for your organization?
 - Colombo was very persuasive. He tried during 10 years to get help for the mission.
 - What are your projects for benefit to the organization?
 - What evidence or metrics could you produce to demonstrate that the exploration was a success?

Video: Architect as an explorer, or... how Ron Jacobs got Microsoft to pay him a trip to Malibu Beach... :-)

- An architect must advocate his causes. Some explanations using real law cases (O. J. Simpson).

- The lawyer in his role as an advocate is very similar to the role of an architect to his clients. He has to know the client business and needs. He has to represent them an an advocate.

- The first thing a advocate must do is: listen. He must enter the client domain. Understand resources, needs, unique challenges, preferences and business climate.
- Second: he must observe. The Art Of Observing. Check "The Software Architect Profession, by Marc and Laura Sewell". He should follow the all existing process once before starting the design. A failure to observe means millions spend to have nothing in production. A very important thing is to have the user cooperation with the implementation. The architect must design by walking around. The trained eye of an architect should identify impossible implementations.
- Third: he must think strategically. The Art Of Strategy. All businesses should have a strategy of how they intend to win. An advocate sometimes has to stand again its client, saying that is impossible to do/succeed.

- An architect must be a designer. Frank Lloyd Wright believed that humanity should be central to all design. He practiced what is called organic architecture.

- A structure must exhibit the 3 qualities of firmitas (strength, utility and beauty).

- Designers must understand engineering (strength)
- Designers must be able to translate user needs into functional structures (utility)
- Designers must be able to create a solution that is pleasing to the eye (beauty)

- We are only done with the goal when people recognize the value and utility of our work. People have to like it.

- Architecture as the Product of Design

- We still havent found a way of doing good software architecture
- Architecture is an ideia, a plan about what the solution that will be built.
- Your job is to create an architecture that will meet the need
- To collaborate effectively you will need to communicate the architecture to different audiences using a variety of tools, media and means

- Maybe the best quality of an architect is that he is a great communicator: he must talk to and make very different people agree

- We must solve the right problem. Requirements are the way we define the problem we are trying to solve. Most people start wondering in different directions because they are not focused on the problem. This is why it is so important so make the problem clear to anyone.

- Constraints limit the solution (...)

- How good is the solution? Must perform well, be secure, be robust and easily managed, but generally these features are not considered functional requirements.

- Resources include people, technology, legacy systems, technical know-how, etc.

- Sometimes the solution found cant be beautiful. Above all, it must be useful to people.

- Becoming an architect is a journey toward becoming one who dreams of the solution rather than the one who builds it. Architects live in a higher abstraction level and are happy with that. When you are flying you cant see the details which are on the ground but you have the higher view that people on the gorund does not. It is a matter of perspective.

- The question that we should be asking most of the time is not if we can built like that it but if we should built like that.

- Microsoft Certified Architect Certification is like "we dont know what it takes to become an architect, but we'll know when we see one" :-)