| term |
definition |
references |
| Articulation |
Articulation means both separation of parts
and connection of parts – decoupling and recoupling. This is sometimes
known as loose coupling.
(Articulation also implies clarity of structure. This
results in a secondary meaning: clear communication.) |
 |
| Bandwidth |
The quantity and complexity of interactions
across an interface or business relationship. The capacity of an interface
or relationship, in terms of its ability to handle quantity and complexity
of interactions. |
|
| Baroque |
A design style involving many layers and folds
of complexity and detail. (In systems, this style often emerges without
conscious intent from an evolutionary development process.) |
|
Bearing
Limit |
The amount of cost or uncertainty that a given
component can be expected to bear. (Uncertainty here may include risk,
surprise, instability or variability.) |
|
| Binding |
A decision to create or strengthen a relationship
between two entities.
See also Much Binding, Late
Binding. |
|
| Biodiversity |
Multiplicity of available solutions to a given
problem or requirement. Healthy competition between components offering
similar services.
Opposite: Monoculture. |
|
| Brand |
The character of a network of
enterprises or services, perceived as a single (individual) entity. |
|
| Broker |
A component that provides interfacing services. |
|
| Character |
The ability of an entity to relate productively
and authentically to other entities.
See also Brand |
|
| Cohesion |
A measure of the unity or integrity of an
entity or community – the degree to which it hangs together. |
|
| Collaboration |
A joint enterprise or activity involving two
or more independent roles.
Business collaboration means autonomous business entities
working together to achieve some business goals. |
|
| Commodity |
A form of value offered by an agent to a community of
other agents. Usually accessed through a defined interface.
Also known as service. |
|
| Component |
A dynamic packaging relationship between a
set of services and a set of capabilities (possibly embedded in one or
more devices). |
|
Component-Based
Business |
Construction or transformation of a business
operation or process by connecting parts together from different sources. |
|
Component-Based
Development (CBD) |
See Component-Based Software Engineering (CBSE) |
|
Component-Based
Software Engineering
(CBSE) |
The construction of large software systems
from software components. Sometimes known as Component-Based Development
(CBD). |
|
| Componentry |
A collection of components. The increasing
articulation of systems into components. |
|
Connectivity
Principle |
Use-value that derives from other people’s
usage of the same component. Economists sometimes refer to this as Network
Externalities. |
|
Consistency
Principle |
The ability to reliably manage the delivery
of services (and their associated benefits) from a given configuration
of devices. This in turn relies on an ability to predict and control the
behaviour of components-in-use, including the emergent properties of large
distributed systems. |
|
| Coupling |
A measure of the linkages between entities:
the extent and rapidity with which changes within one entity impact on
another entity, or the requisite degree of coordination between entities.
Tight Coupling is contrasted with Loose Coupling. |
|
| Creativity |
A generative principle. Sometimes associated
with the generation of ideas, but better associated with the generation
of completed works. |
|
| Critical Mass |
The point where a process (like a chemical
or nuclear reaction) becomes self-sustaining, generating more energy than
it absorbs. In other words, a defined threshold at which there is a qualitative
change. |
|
| Cross-Cutting |
Activities or intentions that cut across the way an enterprise
is configured - creating a demand for collaboration. |
|
| Design Heuristic |
A principle, procedure or other device that
contributes to reduction in the search for a satisfactory solution.
As far as I know, this term was introduced by Allan Newell,
J.C. Shaw and Herbert Simon, in work that dates back to the 1950s. |
|
| Device |
An artefact or instrument or tool or gadget
or mechanism, which may be physical or conceptual. Includes hardware and
software.
According to Borgmann,
it is a general trend of technological development that mechanisms (devices)
are increasingly hidden behind service interfaces. |
|
| Device Paradigm |
Viewing technology exclusively as a device,
and evaluating the technical features and powers of this device, without
having any other perspective. |
|
| Domain |
A generic business process or context, or
a generic area of knowledge. |
|
| Drill-Down |
Progressive decomposition or decapsulation
– getting more and more detail and complexity on demand. |
|
| Ecosystem |
A field of interaction in which entities compete
for survival. |
|
| Emergence |
(The appearance of) properties of a whole
system that are not located in its parts. With engineered systems, these
properties don’t manifest themselves until the whole system is assembled
and commissioned. With evolved systems, these properties often disappear
when the system is taken apart. |
|
| Encapsulation |
The opacity of an interface. Encapsulation
is often taken to mean that some person is not supposed to be able to see
inside. (This depends which person we’re talking about, in which role.
There are different degrees of opacity, from different perspectives.) It
is also taken to mean the converse: that a person responsible for the insides
of a component shouldn’t know anything about how the component is going
to be used, lest this knowledge corrupt the technical purity and perfection
of the component.
Opposite: Decapsulation. |
|
Energy Conservation
Principle |
Getting the maximum value from the minimum
exertion. This is the basis for the economics of scale or scope, and for
reuse. |
|
| Evolution |
Something interesting emerges (develops, unfolds)
from a large number of small changes and interactions. |
|
Feature
Interaction |
A form of interference or emergence, in which
the feature or properties of separate components or services interact in
an unwanted and unexpected way. |
|
| Fetish, Fetishism |
The tendency to describe something as a property
of an isolated entity, instead of describing it through relationships with
other entities.
In particular, the tendency to describe technical artefacts
as if they were independent of any socio-economic context. |
|
| Fit |
Alignment between a system and its environment
(or a system possessing a reasonable degree of alignment – as in "survival
of the fit").
Alignment between an artefact and a set of requirements
– as in "a good fit".
Connectivity of two or more components. |
|
Flexibility
Principle |
The ability to easily substitute devices and
reconfigure systems, in order to satisfy changing requirements. |
|
| Grand Plans |
An overall structure is defined at the start,
and all artefacts are designed to fit this structure. All projects are
managed and coordinated under a single integrated programme. |
|
| Hacking |
Artefacts are built and maintained adhoc,
piecemeal, according to their own needs alone, their features determined
solely by direct costs and benefits. Each project is started and steered
in isolation of other projects; communication between projects only takes
place if of immediate benefit to the projects themselves. |
|
| Heuristic |
See
Design Heuristic. |
|
| Impedance Mismatch |
See
Interaction
Distance. |
|
| Intelligence |
How a complex system behaves in relation to
knowledge, complexity and change. Practical cognitive ability. |
|
| Interaction
Distance |
A measure of the difficulty of communication
or bridging between two entities. Sometimes called Impedance Mismatch. |
|
| Interface |
Something that connects and separates components.
A set of defined operations, expressed in terms of a defined vocabulary,
providing access to one or more services. |
|
| Joined-Up |
Integrated, holistic. Refers either to the requirement
for cross-cutting activity, or the wiring
that supports it. |
|
Late
Binding |
Policy of deferring binding decisions and
commitments to the last possible moment. See Binding. |
distributed
systems
change |
| Legacy |
An artefact, asset, organization or system
with memory that resists necessary change. |
|
| Memory |
Tight coupling with the past. |
|
| Monoculture |
Where one component or service has a dominant
market share, leaving consumers of the service with little effective choice.
Opposite: Biodiversity. |
|
Much
Binding |
A restrictive tangle of commitment and coupling. |
|
Organic
Planning |
An approach to planning that allows integrated
structures to emerge, rather than expecting them to be identified from
the start. |
|
| Pattern |
A judgement of some kind – typically, but
not necessarily a design judgement - partially abstracted from its context. |
|
| Platform |
A system (an organization of devices) offering
a range of generic services. A collection of (generic) services supporting
the implementation of many different service specifications. |
|
| Pleasure |
A state of arousal, involving excitement,
stress and highly focused attention. The distribution of excitement,
energy and attention.
The Pleasure Principle refers to a good balance
between attention (excitement) and inattention (stasis). |
|
| Plug-and-Play |
The connection of two or more components into
a temporary or permanent system that can be operated immediately, with
no further hassle. |
|
Policy
Management |
Rule-based management of an enterprise as
a dynamic network of collaborating services. |
|
| Proxy |
One entity or class stands for (represents
itself as, takes the identity of) another entity or class, for some purpose
within some context. |
|
| Refactoring |
Systematically restructuring something - a business process,
organization, network or software artefact. |
|
| Reification |
An attempt to view the world (or some aspects
of the world) as composed of things. The philosophical basis of the so-called
Object Oriented approach. |
|
| Repetition |
The unplanned or unconscious re-enactment
of some pattern. Wiederholungszwang. |
|
Requisite
Variety |
Just enough complexity of response to the
complexity of demand. |
|
| Resistance |
A manifestation of system stability, frustrating
to those desiring to make systems change. |
|
| Schismogenesis |
A progressive loss of homogeneity or cohesion,
a fragmentation.
Note also Bateson’s
definition: "A process of differentiation in the norms of individual behaviour
resulting from cumulative interaction between individuals". |
|
| Sociotechnical |
A description of something that identifies
both socially mediated relationships and technically mediated relationships. |
|
| Specification |
A description to which some artefact (or class
of artefacts) is to conform. A specification is primarily a description
of behaviour. It may also be regarded as an acceptance test criterion -
a satisfactory component must pass this test. |
|
| Stakeholder |
A person or community regarded as having a
legitimate interest in some system or change programme. |
|
| System |
A bounded description of something as a set
of interconnected parts. |
|
| Tolerance |
Good enough fit. Give and take in a relationship
or collaboration. |
|
| Trust |
A property of a system or relationship based
on expectations of reasonable and fair behaviour. |
|
| Uptight |
Near to the limits of what this entity can
bear, and therefore unable to tolerate much more. |
|
Vertical
Integration |
Single point of control of a business process
or value chain, from one end to the other. |
|
Virtual
Diversification |
Using Component-Based Business to achieve
some of the strategic benefits of diversification. |
|
| Vitality |
Survival. An ongoing transformation of energy
into value. |
|
| Wiring |
How the components of a system are connected together
- configurations and mechanism. |
|
