Multi-level Architectural Evolution Management

Software development is a dynamic process where engineers constantly modify and refine systems. As a consequence, system architecture evolves over time. Software architectural evolution has been managed at different abstraction levels: the meta level, the architectural level, the application level, the implementation level, etc. However, the management supports for architectural evolution are limited to evolution mechanisms in architectural description languages such as subtyping, inheritance, interface, and genericity. This paper presents a model-oriented version and configuration control approach to managing the evolution of architectural entities in configurations at different abstraction levels as well as logical relationships among them. This paper also illustrates our approach in building an architectural configuration management system that is capable of managing configurations and versions of software architecture across multiple levels of abstraction in a uniform and tightly connected manner