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Software Architecture Guide

ISO/IEC/IEEE 42010 Architecture Description Standard

Explanation

Section titled “Explanation”

ISO/IEC/IEEE 42010 is a standard about how to describe an architecture. It does not describe one particular architecture. It defines the ideas an architecture description should use.

History. IEEE Standard 1471 was the predecessor. It formalized the view concepts in 2000. The 2011 edition of 42010 was approved by ISO member bodies in July 2011, by a vote of 21 to 0. A second edition, ISO/IEC/IEEE 42010:2022, was released in November 2022.

Architecture versus description. The standard treats a system’s architecture and the description of it as two different things. The description is what you write down to tell others about the architecture.

Views and viewpoints. An architecture description consists of one or more architecture views. A viewpoint frames one or more stakeholder concerns. A stakeholder is a person or group with an interest in the system. A concern is something they care about. See the articles Architecture View, Architecture Viewpoint, Stakeholder and Concern.

Languages. An architecture description language (ADL) is any means of expression used to describe a software architecture.

Example

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A team builds an online shop. The owner worries about running costs. Operations staff worry about uptime. The team picks one viewpoint for each worry. The cost viewpoint leads to a view of hosting. The uptime viewpoint leads to a view of servers and failover. Together these views form the architecture description. The running shop itself stays separate from those documents.

An architecture description is formed from views; a viewpoint frames stakeholder concerns.

Diagram source 
flowchart LR
  A[Architecture description] --> V[Architecture view]
  P[Viewpoint] -->|frames| C[Stakeholder concern]
  V -.- P

Checks

Section titled “Checks”
  • The document describes the architecture through one or more architecture views.
  • Each viewpoint used states which stakeholder concerns it frames.
  • The description is kept distinct from the architecture of the system it describes.
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Sources

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