Supporting architecture evaluation process with collaborative applications

The software architecture community has proposed several approaches to assess the capability of a system's architecture with respect to desired quality attributes (such as maintainability and performance). Scenario-based approaches are considered effective and mature. However, these methods heavily rely on face-to-face meetings, which are expensive and time consuming. Encouraged by the successful adoption of Internet-based technologies for several meeting based activities, we have been developing an approach to support architecture evaluation using Web-based collaborative applications, in this paper, we present a preliminary framework for conducting architecture evaluation in a distributed arrangement. We identify some supportive technologies and their expected benefits. We also present some of the initial findings of a research program designed to assess the effectiveness of the proposed idea. Findings of this study provide some support for distributed architecture evaluation.