Design Outline

Design Outline symbol

Design Outlines strictly are not part of OIAm, in that they are not "pure" architecture artefacts. Instead, they are the documents that create the mapping between technology-independent infrastructure functions and the technological implementation of these. Creation of the Design Outlines is the task of the lead infrastructure designers.

In essence, Design Outlines are created for whole Pattern Variants, although on occasion a Design Outline can be drafted for a single Building Block Variant.

Purpose

Purpose of the Design Outline is twofold:

1. the Design Outline is a high level engineering product (with an architectural connotation) that is directly usable by engineers and designers. As such, it conveys the intent of the architects to the engineers.
2. the Design Outline serves as an easy checklist, with which to check if the realized infrastructure actually follows the drafted architecture, both in spirit and to the letter. As such, it conveys the result of the engineering process back to the architects.

Content of a Design Outline

Contents of the Design Outline are:

• description: a high-level explanation outlining how the set of technical components realise the infrastructure function(s) required by the Pattern Variant or Building Block Variant;
• the topology of the technical solution, usually one or more drawings containing "Technical Components" and their interconnections, accompanied by an explanation/description;
• a list of these Technical Components mentioned in the topology, with
  • the actual product(s) chosen as Technical Component,
  • an explanation for the functionality it provides,
  • the mapping of the functions in the Pattern Variant to the Technical Component in question (both tabular and graphically), and
  • the rationale justifying the choice for this particular product;
• a list of explanations, each of which deals with one Element in the Pattern Variant, and shows how that Element has been catered for in the Design Outline;
• a list of additional Technical Components: guidelines and notes that contain pointers for the designers and engineers that will create the detail design.

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Note: these are the 0 currently available Design Outlines: