Capstone: Architecture Project

About this course

The architecture capstone for the Solution Architect and AI Solution Architect pathways. Each learner architects a solution for a real problem in their own organisation (redacted as needed) or a provided enterprise brief: requirements and quality attributes, alternatives and trade-off analysis, a full architecture package, risk and regulatory analysis, cost model and roadmap. Weekly sessions run as design reviews, and the course ends with a defence before a mock architecture review board.

For: architect, software engineer, tech leader.

Learning outcomes

On successful completion you will be able to:

1. 1Elicit and analyse business goals, constraints and stakeholder concerns, and produce architecturally significant requirements with quantified quality attributes.
2. 2Design a complete solution architecture package covering context, container, deployment, data and security views, integration design, NFRs, ADRs, a cost model and a roadmap.
3. 3Evaluate alternative architectures with a structured method such as scenario-based evaluation and fitness functions, and justify the chosen option.
4. 4Critically assess the state of the art relevant to the problem, including emerging technology and regulation such as GDPR, NIS2, DORA and the EU AI Act.
5. 5Lead an architecture review-board defence, managing challenge from technical, security, financial and regulatory perspectives.
6. 6Plan the implementation and transition (roadmap, risks, organisational change and governance) and take responsibility for its feasibility.

Modules and lessons

1. Week 1Problem framing⌄

   • Problem framing and stakeholder analysis
2. Week 2Requirements and quality attributes⌄

   • Architecturally significant requirements and quality attributes
3. Week 3Options and trade-offs⌄

   • Candidate architectures and trade-off analysis
4. Week 4Design review⌄

   • Architecture design review
5. Week 5Risk, security and compliance⌄

   • Risk, security and regulatory review
6. Week 6Cost, roadmap and transition⌄

   • Cost model, roadmap and transition plan
7. Week 7Review-board defence⌄

   • Final review-board defence
8. Week 8Retrospective and portfolio⌄

   • Retrospective and professional portfolio

Assessment

• Design review (45%)

  Solution architecture document and diagram set, reviewed at the week-4 milestone and assessed on final submission.

• Project (20%)

  Implementation roadmap, risk register and regulatory analysis for the solution.

• Viva (35%)

  Forty-five-minute review-board defence before three mentors acting as CTO, CISO and CFO.

Pass mark 60%. Grades: Distinction, Merit, Pass.