E-Business and IS Solutions: An Architectural Approach to Business Problems and Opportunities

Rating:
Summary: Advice you can understand and use
Review: A web presence is now as mandatory in a business as a tax ID. Although tax laws are complex and subject to change, at least they only change once a year at a predictable time and there are experts embodied in software and in carbon that can help you sort them out. The solutions to the problems of e-business change several times a year, are subject to the whims of employee defections and customers that can be extremely fickle; often have no precise solution and you are racing against competitors just as determined as you are. Fortunately, there are also alternatives in the area of e-business as well.
Many of those alternatives are embodied in this book, which was written at the level of managers rather than those who construct the IS solutions. Some of the solutions, such as always make sure you hire and retain good people are slightly above the level of "duh", and yet in many cases the simple is the most overlooked.
The emphasis throughout is on architecture and strategy. With the rapid pace of e-business development, where you can flame up and flame out in weeks, you must build your systems so that they are as open ended on the high side as possible. The advice put forward here is a prescription for sound management of what is now the most complex of all the mandatory facets of a business. Furthermore, there are also several places where the author puts forward danger signals to help identify whether analysis paralysis is setting in.
There is one excellent example concerning how to create solutions. When presented with a problem about shortening a winding road, there is the simple solution of connecting the endpoints. However, if it is necessary to visit the intermediate points on the old road, this solution is hardly optimal. Sometimes incremental, seemingly partial solutions are the most effective.
If you are a manager looking for guidance in how to start, build, maintain or expand an e-business structure, then this book will help a great deal. No magic formulas or absurd hype, just sound fundamental principles that will improve your chances for success.

Rating:
Summary: Principles & models cut through complexity
Review: This book is a light, high-level view of architecture. It doesn't pretend to be a comprehensive "how-to" or highly technical tome. Instead, it breaks down the complexities of developing an architecture into a set of guiding principles and seven discrete steps. Products are not mentioned and technology is subordinated to broad discussions instead of specifics.

It starts with an extremely brief, but informational, description of the characteristics of e-business and some of the challenges and opportunities that set it apart from an architectural requirements standpoint. This is followed with an in-depth discussion of the "essence of architecture" that sets the tone and pace for the rest of the book. I like this because there is a vast difference between a definition, which can be succinctly described, and an essence, which is more a philosophy. The philosophy given by the author is sensible and lays the foundation for the principles and seven steps of defining the architecture that follow in later chapters. Especially valuable is way architecture is broken down into views: component, design, blueprint and framework. Also included in the essence section are two chapters, one addressing object-oriented methods and the other on project scope. Each contained a wealth of information and some sound points of view and advice. Regardless of your knowledge or experience I recommend reading through these two chapters because of the fresh ideas that pop up throughout them. It forced me to see things in ways that I do not normally observe.

The seven-step solution building process encompasses the eight chapters of Part II. The first chapter, introduction, gives guiding principles and these are worth printing on a large poster and memorizing. The process itself is (1) business modeling, (2) IS modeling, (3) Current IS analysis, (4) IS architectural planning, (5) implementation planning, (6) deployment and (7) review. In one respect there is nothing new or unique about this process, but the value in reading through each of the chapters is how clearly the approach is described and how the supporting information is developed. The writing here (and illustrations) exemplify clarity. I gained a lot, too, from the many lists and tables.

Part III is titled "Let's Get Practical" and is where the author ties together loose ends by addressing the use of consultants, methodologies (good and bad) and reuse. There is a lot of wisdom and advice here as in the rest of the book - much of it delivered with humor and always with good sense.

Overall, this is an excellent book. It's well written, filled with information and puts you in the right frame of mind to tackle architecture in a methodical manner. What it does not do is provide technical details or espouse any particular product or technology - there are other books for that.

Rating:
Summary: Principles & models cut through complexity
Review: This book is a light, high-level view of architecture. It doesn't pretend to be a comprehensive "how-to" or highly technical tome. Instead, it breaks down the complexities of developing an architecture into a set of guiding principles and seven discrete steps. Products are not mentioned and technology is subordinated to broad discussions instead of specifics.

It starts with an extremely brief, but informational, description of the characteristics of e-business and some of the challenges and opportunities that set it apart from an architectural requirements standpoint. This is followed with an in-depth discussion of the "essence of architecture" that sets the tone and pace for the rest of the book. I like this because there is a vast difference between a definition, which can be succinctly described, and an essence, which is more a philosophy. The philosophy given by the author is sensible and lays the foundation for the principles and seven steps of defining the architecture that follow in later chapters. Especially valuable is way architecture is broken down into views: component, design, blueprint and framework. Also included in the essence section are two chapters, one addressing object-oriented methods and the other on project scope. Each contained a wealth of information and some sound points of view and advice. Regardless of your knowledge or experience I recommend reading through these two chapters because of the fresh ideas that pop up throughout them. It forced me to see things in ways that I do not normally observe.

The seven-step solution building process encompasses the eight chapters of Part II. The first chapter, introduction, gives guiding principles and these are worth printing on a large poster and memorizing. The process itself is (1) business modeling, (2) IS modeling, (3) Current IS analysis, (4) IS architectural planning, (5) implementation planning, (6) deployment and (7) review. In one respect there is nothing new or unique about this process, but the value in reading through each of the chapters is how clearly the approach is described and how the supporting information is developed. The writing here (and illustrations) exemplify clarity. I gained a lot, too, from the many lists and tables.

Part III is titled "Let's Get Practical" and is where the author ties together loose ends by addressing the use of consultants, methodologies (good and bad) and reuse. There is a lot of wisdom and advice here as in the rest of the book - much of it delivered with humor and always with good sense.

Overall, this is an excellent book. It's well written, filled with information and puts you in the right frame of mind to tackle architecture in a methodical manner. What it does not do is provide technical details or espouse any particular product or technology - there are other books for that.

Rating:
Summary: Sound principles, successful approach and common sense
Review: This slim, 288-page book addresses architecture as a set of principles and a seven-step approach. It's filled with common sense, and will provide you with the big picture and high-level steps that will place architecture into a coherent context.

First, the principles and approach really are aligned to e-business although they can also be applied to any system or enterprise application. Second, the book may appear to be basic, but the author manages to get you think out of the box every step of the way. An example is the scope-trade off discussion in chapter 4 where you are shown an illustration of a road improvement project that depicts an ideal (and not so feasible) solution and some alternatives. In a single, simple illustration and a few paragraphs the whole concept of scope trade-off crystallizes and comes into sharp focus. Another example is a text box on page 37 that describes how the author and his wife, both IS professionals, attempted to devise a check book system for personal use. The story drives home the fact that even professionals and prime stakeholders can get requirements wrong.

Among the things I like most are: the seven-stage process itself and associated principles, which make you step back and look at architecture as its most basic level; the discussion of architecture and its relationship to object-orientation is one of the best compare and contrast pieces on the topic I've read; and the discussion on component-based software engineering is concise and completely aligned to that approach to both e-business in general and architecture in particular.

This book reminds me of those written by Gerald Weinberg on that it focuses on deeper aspects of a subject than mere technology. True, the technical aspects of this book are lightweight, but the underlying principles and approach are anything but. If you're seeking low-level technical information on architecture pass this by. If you want to read a book that will inspire you to think out of the box, organize the important elements of architecture and infuse massive doses of common sense, this book is a treasure and has my highest recommendation.

Rating:
Summary: Sound principles, successful approach and common sense
Review: This slim, 288-page book addresses architecture as a set of principles and a seven-step approach. It's filled with common sense, and will provide you with the big picture and high-level steps that will place architecture into a coherent context.

First, the principles and approach really are aligned to e-business although they can also be applied to any system or enterprise application. Second, the book may appear to be basic, but the author manages to get you think out of the box every step of the way. An example is the scope-trade off discussion in chapter 4 where you are shown an illustration of a road improvement project that depicts an ideal (and not so feasible) solution and some alternatives. In a single, simple illustration and a few paragraphs the whole concept of scope trade-off crystallizes and comes into sharp focus. Another example is a text box on page 37 that describes how the author and his wife, both IS professionals, attempted to devise a check book system for personal use. The story drives home the fact that even professionals and prime stakeholders can get requirements wrong.

Among the things I like most are: the seven-stage process itself and associated principles, which make you step back and look at architecture as its most basic level; the discussion of architecture and its relationship to object-orientation is one of the best compare and contrast pieces on the topic I've read; and the discussion on component-based software engineering is concise and completely aligned to that approach to both e-business in general and architecture in particular.

This book reminds me of those written by Gerald Weinberg on that it focuses on deeper aspects of a subject than mere technology. True, the technical aspects of this book are lightweight, but the underlying principles and approach are anything but. If you're seeking low-level technical information on architecture pass this by. If you want to read a book that will inspire you to think out of the box, organize the important elements of architecture and infuse massive doses of common sense, this book is a treasure and has my highest recommendation.