Principles for Evaluating the Quality Attributes of a Software Architecture

Software quality is the degree to which software possesses a desired combination of attributes (e.g., reliability, interoperability). In this paper we describe a few principles for analyzing a software architecture to determine if it exhibits certain quality attributes. We show how analysis techniques indigenous to the various quality attribute communities can provide a foundation for performing software architecture evaluation. We also show how the principles provide a context for existing evaluation ap..