Andy Turner wrote:I've recently started on the second part of the exam, so I'm using the "study guide" as a reference guide. However, I have two quick questions. In the example provided in chapter 9, it talks about JSF, JSP's etc, however, no where in the requirements does it state that a web front end is required, are we just supposed to assume that this is the requirement?
You are right about the fact that it does not explicitly mention that a thin client is required. However, there are other aspects in the requirements that might narrow down the choice for you. For example, the non functional requirements might state certain stringent scalability requirements which might be impossible to achieve with anything other than a thin client architecture. Also, if your system will be accessed by an unknown number of users who won't install anything on their systems, you just narrowed down the choice to one.
The politically correct answer is that any kind of front end that can satisfy the stated functional and non functional requirements will work. However, it will be very difficult to justify how a 2 tier architecture can meet the requirements better than a 3 or N tier architecture in the context of the
SCEA assignment. So the blunt answer IMHO is to just architect for a web front end.
Andy Turner wrote:
Also, in the requirements for the chapter 9 example, it doesn't mention user security, or login requirements, etc, but in the deployment diagram it references an LDAP server, user admin pages, and reporting pages, again are we just supposed to assume that ALL of the examples require LDAP, user admin pages and reporting? I originally thought we should only be providing details on what is provided, not "reading between the lines", would I lose marks if I didn't put in an LDAP server and the admin pages?
I think that the requirements provided will almost always have some gaps in them. As an architect, you will probably have to fill in the gaps. Besides, even though some of the diagrams show LDAP, admin and reporting information, it might be depicted there just so that the architecture diagrams would be complete. It does not necessarily mean that reporting or admin pages will be developed by the developers at the current time.
In the context of the SCEA assignment, it probably would demonstrate to the evaluator that you have thought through some of these common challenges and addressed them appropriately in your diagrams though not necessarily in the implementation.
Just my thoughts though....