Two Case Studies of Subsystem Design for Extensible General-Purpose Software

摘要

In this paper, we discuss subsystem design guidelines for extensible general-211u001epurpose information systems, i.e., systems that are designed to be applicable in 211u001edifferent application areas. We extract guidelines from a case study of the 211u001eredesign and extension of an advanced commercial workflow management system and 211u001eplace them into the context of existing software engineering research. The 211u001eguidelines are then validated against the design decisions made in the 211u001econstruction of a widely used web-based CSCW system. Key aspect in our approach 211u001eis the distinction between essential and physical architectures. The essential 211u001earchitecture is based on functional requirements, paying proper attention to the 211u001edirect mapping of abstract functional concepts to modules in the architecture. 211u001eNon-functional requirements are reflected in the physical architecture, taking 211u001einto account software clustering, distribution, and replication.