Capturing Architectural Knowledge of Software Product Lines

The architecture of a software systemis defined by significant decisions that drive the way in which the software is designed implemented and maintained. In the context of software product lines, these decisions will determine the design of an architecture that provides the software with the ability to be configured for different product variants and extended to accommodate future requirements. Although, variability models describe the different configurations of current and future products that the product line supports, the knowledge of how the architecture was designed to support variations of a product in space and time exists only in the architects¿ mind or remains implicit in architecturalmodels. This book argues that the knowledge found in architecturalmodels and design rationale can be used to facilitate the derivation of product variants and the evolution of the product line. To support this notion, we propose the AKinSPL method for capturing the architectural knowledge in software product lines.