Architecture
Architecture refers to the planning phase of the software development process, much like architecture refers to the same in the process of building a house. The builders are the coders of the product, once it is architected. This is an extraordinarily important phase of the overall development of the product, and consists of thoroughly understanding and articulating the needs of the users (of the system) and the coders (for the system). This serves as a roadmap for current and future development for the product. Poor architecture may not be apparent during early releases of the product (the alpha and beta phases), but as the product evolves and newer versions are created, architectural decisions will become more impactful to development. This has been cited as a cause for the demise of the Netscape development process.
Maximizing Business Potential
