What's So Fundamental About Architecture?

Abstract A new standard on architecture fundamentals is under development to be published as ISO/IEC/IEEE 42024. This paper provides an overview of the key concepts in this standard and the rationale for these ideas. This standard specifies a core set of vocabulary, architecture concepts, and architecting principles associated with the architecture practice. It is applicable to various entities such as enterprises, business units, capability areas, capabilities, mission areas, missions, systems, systems of systems, families of systems, infrastructure, products, services, product lines, hardware items, software applications and technologies. This standard can be used as a foundation for development of architecture standards and practices, and for the development of architectures and architecture models. It can also be used as a basis for implementation of architecture standards and reference architectures, as well as development of organizational training and guidebooks on architecting methodologies and for related processes, methods and tools. This paper provides an introduction to the key principles and concepts that can serve as the foundation for good architecture practice.