Review the Architecture

Problem: Blind spots in the architecture and design

Context:

A software artifact whose quality is to be assessed for improvement.

Forces:

Architecture decisions affect many people over a long time.

Individual Architects and Designers can develop tunnel vision.

A shared architectural vision is important.

Even low-level design and implementation decisions matter.

All things are deeply interwingled (Ed Yourdon).

Solution:

All architectural decisions should be reviewed by all Architects. Architects should review each others' code. The reviews should be frequent--even daily--early in the project. Reviews should be informal, with a minimum of paperwork.

Resulting Context:

This pattern sets the context for Mercenary Analyst. It will also solve potential problems that have been pointed out for Code Ownership.

The intent of this pattern is to increase coupling between those with a stake in the architecture and implementation, which solves the stated problem indirectly.

Design Rationale:

QPW; a successful object-oriented project in AT&T.

Next: Code Ownership