Date of Award

3-9-2009

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science in Systems Engineering

Department

Department of Systems Engineering and Management

First Advisor

Jeffrey D. Havlicek, PhD

Second Advisor

Alfred E. Thal, Jr., PhD

Abstract

This research presents a methodology to evaluate the quality of a system's architecture using principles drawn from Value-Focused Thinking (VFT) and resulting in a Value-Driven Enterprise Architecture Score (VDEA-Score). This is an overall numerical architecture quality score useful to a system's management team to identify the advantages and disadvantages of a system design and associated architecture documentation or to track its quality across discrete evaluation epochs. This effort determined which aspects of the architecture are most valuable to the stakeholder in the areas of (1) the system effectiveness values (quality of the instantiated system being represented and its ability to perform its stated mission) and (2) the architecture quality values (intrinsic quality of the products themselves in terms of documentation standards and desired attributes). The results are reported across three theses. In this thesis, the architecture documentation quality aspects are specifically addressed by examining various "ilities" (e.g., usability, modifiability, accessibility, etc.) regarded as essential to any architecture. The evaluation methodology was tested against architectures from two enterprises including the sponsor's enterprise of joint force protection. An overall architecture documentation quality score is reported for both enterprises useful for identifying areas for potential improvement.

AFIT Designator

AFIT-GSE-ENV-09-M03

DTIC Accession Number

ADA496161

Comments

Co-authored thesis;
Co-advised thesis.

Download

Share

COinS