During the first half of the 1990s, software architecture became recognized as a first class entity. Initially, research focused primarily on the initial design and assessment of architectures, but soon the community realized that the primary area should focus should be on the stages after the initial architecture design. As a consequence, there was, especially among practitioners, a significant shift from architecture to the role of the software architect, having the responsibility to protect the conceptual integrity and “future-proofness” of the system.

Although the architect is absolutely central, this does not mean that the architect does not need tools, techniques and mechanisms to turn aspects of the job from art to science or, preferably, engineering. One of the focus areas that I have studied, as well as many others in the research community, is the notion of architectural design decisions. In the work together with my PhD students, there are a number of articles that address this topic.