The Meaning of Solution Architecture

This book will be your first step in the solution architecture world, acting as a comprehensive guide to learn all about solution architecture, and allowing you to become a professional solution architect. In this chapter, we will explore the meaning of solution architecture, and how it is the foundation of solution development in an organization. A robust solution architecture design helps successful software application development in a complex organization, covering all aspects, from IT infrastructure, application security, and reliability, to operational aspects in production.

For successful application development, defining the solution architecture should be the first step, which then lays out the foundations and the robust building blocks of implementation. Solution architecture handles critical, non-functional requirements such as scalability, high availability, maintainability, performance, and security while keeping business requirements in mind.

A solution architect is a person who is responsible for designing solution architecture by collaborating with and across stakeholders. The solution architect analyzes the functional requirements and defines non-functional requirements in order to cover all aspects of the solution—and avoid any surprises. Each solution has multiple constraints, such as cost, budget, timeline, and regulatory constraints, so the solution architect must consider them while selecting technology during the application design process to solve a given business problem.

The solution architect develops a proof of concept and prototype in order to evaluate various technology platforms, and then chooses the best strategy for solution implementation.

They mentor the team throughout solution development and provide post-launch guidance to maintain and scale the final product.

In this chapter, you will learn about the following topics:

• What is solution architecture?
• The evolution of solution architecture
• Why is solution architecture important?
• The benefits of solution architecture
• Solution architecture in the public cloud

By the end of this chapter, you will have learned about the benefits of solution architecture to every aspect of an enterprise application. You will evaluate solution architecture in the public cloud and develop a cloud-native approach to architecture design.