ABSTRACT
If you look at the selection of courses at any school of architecture in the world, there is no single course or course series named “How to Design an Architecture 101.” Design is taught through mentored practice in a studio setting where design and structural concepts are put into practice by students. The work of students is critiqued by experts. Students then reflect upon what they did, the critique of their work, and what they might do differently in a similar situation next time. Designing building architecture is part science, part engineering, part art form, and part economics. This makes it impossible to develop a recipe for architectural design that fits all situations and business contexts. What students of building architecture must learn is a few principles and how to apply intuition and judgment. So it is for software-intensive systems architectural design. In this section the most important word is guidance. The reader should not look for or expect a simple, easy-to-follow formula that will yield a design-architectural design simply does not work that way. Recall that architectural design is a process, not an event. Sitting at a desk, partitioning a system into elements, and designing structures are parts of the larger design process. This is the fun stuff that architects long to do. The purpose of this chapter is to provide practicing architects with some ideas to guide them in undertaking the fun part of the design process.
