Evaluating the modifiability of software architectural designs

In this chapter, we propose an architectural design evaluation technique called EBEAM (Expert-Based Evaluation of Architecture for Modifiability) that assists experts in articulating their knowledge of architectural designs and expressing the knowledge in measurable terms. EBEAM supports the evaluation of different architectural design versions for modifiability. In addition, EBEAM supports relative comparison between these design versions and the target design. We develop EBEAM as a generalized technique that is reusable for evaluating other architectural design attributes, apart from modifiability. We discuss EBEAM in detail and report on two case studies that investigate its applicability, and one study that validates the results of the evaluations made using EBEAM.