Economics-Driven Software Architecture

Foreword by Len Bass

Len Bass

NICTA, Sydney

Economic analysis of software architecture has great promise, and the chapters in this book propose a number of different approaches. One missing element, however, is the management of uncertainty. Economic analysis is either predictive or explanatory. In either case, there is uncertainty due to the assumptions of the models being used, the difficulty of gathering sufficient data, or the judgments of the architect. Uncertainty can be managed, however, and bounded. In this Foreword, I will discuss some of the causes of uncertainty, the various types of uncertainty, and techniques for bounding different types of uncertainty.

Economists make a distinction between microeconomics—focusing on the behavior ...