Knocking down the Ivory Tower
Why software architecture should be a collaborative affair
I’ve been a solutions architect for seven years. Prior to that, I was a software architect for five years(I’m still not 100% sure of the difference, btw, asides from the glossy title on some business cards). Before that, I was an engineer (software or otherwise) for another ten.
No matter how many docs I write, no matter how many diagrams I diagram, no matter how many architectures I come up with, I am still a dev at heart. I still write code daily. I work with other devs on projects, submit and contribute to code reviews; I write unit tests, still build functioning code for my platforms. Clearly, I’m not as ‘in the weeds’ as the other devs and engineers, but I don’t like the idea of removing my hand from software development completely.
Why? First off, I genuinely like writing code. It is my assumption that all architects, at some point, were devs like I was, and that they are reasonably good at coding. That’s usually why devs get promoted to architecture: their experience and knowledge have raised them up to an architecture position. Writing code is fundamental to the game. If I don’t write software regularly, how in the heck am I supposed to understand what my devs, engineers, and testers are suffering, so that I can build better architectures…
