Architecting Principles for Self-Managing Enterprise IT Systems

Abstract

Economic mega-shifts and technology advances have created an entirely new context for the enterprise IT systems. It is now a very common expectation that the cost/performance ratios will be constantly improving while always offering better services and novel IT features. To fit such expectations, enterprise IT systems should be architected differently. In general, cost savings should be used to finance innovative projects fitting into enterprise architecting blueprints. In this paper we give a top-level view into typical enterprise IT system and outline four architecting principles to guide the implementation of these innovative projects articulated together as 'renewal program' across entire IT. After describing in more depth each principle, we conclude with some practical challenges and outline a few interesting research directions. We also share some practical insights from an internal HP project.