Overview of the Enterprise Architecture Framework

Abstract

An enterprise architecture framework is really a statement of philosophy. It spells out what is important about how enterprise systems should be designed and built and how they should interoperate with one another. Like any philosophy, it is a means of organizing one's thoughts about the task to be accomplished. The enterprise architecture framework is built on a foundation of model-based engineering. It relies on creating models that accurately capture the most important elements of the enterprise architecture in a format that enables automated analysis. It relies on carefully modeling what is needed to govern the enterprise and only those things; everything else is either completely extraneous or properly the domain of a solution architecture (i.e., an architecture for a specific system to be built).