![](bg8.png)
of PL from economic viewpoint and SA for
fulfilling quality requirements. Quality analysis at
the conceptual level examines the relationship
between architectural views and architectural styles,
as an architectural style is also considered to have an
impact on quality attributes of the system. In this
way, the result of the examination responds to
questions such as: (1) upon what architectural view
does the architectural style focus, (2) what specific
quality attributes the style is considered to support,
and (3) what kind of assumptions are made about
context or environment. Assuming that there are
already known benefits and drawbacks of each style
in relation to quality attributes, the analysis of
conceptual descriptions has the aim of checking
styles and violations to the standard patterns. Also,
the role of analysis at the conceptual level is to
provide a knowledge base of the PLA so as to
perform a more comprehensive analysis at the
concrete level description. Thus, the experts’
knowledge could be better structured and used in a
more systematic way to generate scenarios
associated with the most important quality attribute
of the domain. Towards an architectural knowledge
base for wireless service engineering some progress
has been made and described in (Niemela et al,
2005). The quality analysis of the concrete
architecture makes it possible to obtain better results
that improve the design. Concrete architecture
permits more relevant and accurate results.
The PLA of the DiSeP is the first stage of a
software development cycle and we have tried to
model it by means of applying an approach for PL
initiation from PL requirements. The development of
the DiSeP PLA is an iterative process, so the
analysis is as well. One of the goals of analyzing the
conceptual design of PLA is its relevancy for
uncovered PL features. On the concrete architecture
we analyzed adaptability and portability as
development quality attributes, using a scenario-
based method. We mention that is very important to
consider the economic aspects of the analysis. We
could not exemplify the value analysis, due to the
lack of an economic data model. However a value
metric of an economic model is required to make
decisions about PL scope and in commonality
analysis, too. (Clements, 2007) described SA
decisions based on an economic model.
In future research we want to validate this
systematic approach in various software application
domains where a product line is initiated. More work
is needed to develop systematic ways of bridging
other quality and economic requirements to a PLA.
However this paper presented the main concepts and
justified why this concepts are required.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We wish to thank the anonymous referees for their
valuable suggestions and comments.
REFERENCES
Bass L., P. Clement and R. Kazman, (2003) Software
Architecture in Practice, Addison Wesley, Reading.
Dobrica L., E. Niemelä, (2002) A Survey on Software
Architecture Analysis Methods, IEEE Trans
Software. Eng., Vol.28 (7), 638-653.
Dobrica L., E. Niemelä, (2000), A Strategy for Analyzing
Product Line Software Architecture, VTT
Publications 427, Espoo, Finland, 124 p.
Hauser J.R. and Don Clausing (1988), The House of
Quality, Harvard Business Review, May-June.
IEEE Std 1471-2000 (2000), IEEE Recommended
Practice for Architectural Description of Software-
Intensive Systems.
ISO/IEC WD1 42010 (2007), Systems and Software
Engineering – Architectural Description.
IEEE 1061 (1998), IEEE Standard. for Software. Quality
Metrics Methodology, IEEE Std 1061-1998.
Krutchen P. B., (1995), The 4+1 View Model of
Architecture, IEEE Software, Nov.,pp. 42-50.
Matinlassi, M., E. Niemelä and L. Dobrica, (2002),
Quality-driven architecture design and quality
analysis method - A revolutionary initiation approach
to product line architecture, VTT Publications 456,
Espoo, Finland, 139p.
Niemelä E. and T. Ihme, (2001), Product Line Software
Engineering of Embedded Systems, Procs of SSR'01,
Symposium on Software Reusability, pp. 118 – 125.
Niemelä E., Kalaoja J., P. Lago, (2005) Toward an
Architectural Knowledge Base for Wireless Service
Engineering, IEEE Trans. Software Eng., Vol 31 (5),
p. 361 – 379.
Purhonen A. , E. Niemelä , M. Matinlassi, (2004)
Viewpoints of DSP software and service architectures,
Journal of Systems and Software, Vol.69(1-2), p.57-
73.
Tharumarajah A, A.J. Wells, L. Nemes, (1996) A
Comparison of the bionic, fractal and holonic
manufacturing concepts, International Journal of
Computer Integrated Manufacturing 9 (3) 217-226.
Clements P. (2007), An economic model for software
architecture decisions, Procs. ICSEW’07 International
Conference on Software Engineering Workshops.
Miller J and Mukerji J, 2003, MDA Guide Version 1.0.1.,
Object Management Group, 2003.
Jaaksi A et al, 1999, Tried & True Object Development:
Industry-Proven Approaches with UML. Cambridge
Univ. Press, 1999.
Hofmeister C et al., 2000, Applied Software Architecture.
Addison-Wesley, 2000.
QUALITY AND VALUE ANALYSIS OF SOFTWARE PRODUCT LINE ARCHITECTURES
71