System Architectures: Legacy Tools/Methods, DoDAF Descriptions and Design Through System Alternative Enumeration

The System Entity Structure (SES) Enterprise Alternative Evaluator (SEAE) provides a “next step” to government mandated architecture frameworks by augmenting pictorial views into structured system representations for making design decisions. The Department of Defense Architecture Framework (DoDAF), a documentation tool used to portray operational concepts and supporting system details, is presently void of a malleable design description that structures processes and technologies for automatic enumeration of alternatives. DoDAF architecture views contain entity-like nodes; each representing documented processes and technologies. The SEAE leverages both DoDAF view nodes and computer science–based operations research to provide an evaluation technique that generates an operational concept's alternative architectures for future evaluation.