Week1 - Introduction to Enterprise Architecture

What impressed me the most in the first class should be the Zachman Framework that professor introduced to us. During my undergraduate study in information system, I learned some knowledge of system analysis & design. At that time, system analysis are all about models that I don't quite understand how they cooperate to describe a system. Now through the Zachman Framework, the intricate models can be placed in a two-dimension diagram.

With the intersection of six communication questions( what, how, where, who, when, why)and six rows according to  specific transformations. It is suddenly clear that how they are structured to define an enterprise.



The MIT Enterprise Guide and FEA Practice Guide, both present the current state of the architectures thoroughly with  a variety of tools  and diagrams. This makes think about that if I was the writer or the analyst, how would I  present the architecture to my customer and the programmer? Am I be able to use these tools properly? I believe lectures and the group project in EA course can help gain such knowledge and experience.




As for the case study, I sensed the importance of IT for companies in providing competitive advantage even if all technologies are widely available.   No matter how widely available technologies are, they can’t deal with customized requirements for every organization.  Nowadays work is becoming more complex and need more analysis and decision making.  As put in the reading material, what organizations need is something integrated that can intelligently controls complex business process and be adapted to satisfy the change of needs. IT can provide such systems based on analysis of the business architectures, thus makes organization processes more coordinated and efficient. Besides, IT is changing the way companies transact business with customers, suppliers and partners when information systems are used to organize such information.

EA can create enterprise-wide views and help organize the elements to provide a strategic architecture, including robust protocols for accessing the applications, high-quality integrated data stores and sound methodology for managing the overall process. Besides, EA can identify performance gaps in line of business activities and capabilities of supporting IT services, systems and networks, thus can give a provision of uncertainty.