Maintainability

This book is about software architecture. One of the definitions of architecture is the structure of a system or process. In our case, it’s the structure of a software system.

Architecture is designing this structure with a purpose. We’re consciously designing our software system to fulfill certain requirements. There are functional requirements that the software has to fulfill to create value for its users. Without functionality, software is worthless, because it produces no value.

There are also quality requirements (also called non-functional requirements) that the software should fulfill to be considered high quality by its users, developers, and stakeholders. One such quality requirement is maintainability.

What would you say if I told you that maintainability as a quality attribute, in a way, is more important than functionality and that we should design our software for maintainability over everything else? Once we have established maintainability...