System architecture analyses of distributed ship systems offer a practical view of system behavior over all operational states; however, the effectiveness of these analyses can be bound by limited computational performance or capability. Deactivation diagrams provide an alternative view to conventional system architecture descriptions, allowing for rapid analysis of system connectivity and flow based on precomputed single-state system descriptions. This thesis explores the development of system deactivation diagrams and their use in early-stage naval ship system design. Software tools developed in C++ and VBA as part of this research support the Virginia Tech (VT) Naval Ship Design Concept and Requirements Exploration (CandRE) process and tools utilizing the U.S. Navy's Leading-Edge Architecture for Prototyping Systems (LEAPS) framework database. These tools incorporate automated path-finding algorithms developed based on proven network theory and effective computational methods for use in performing ship system deactivation analysis. Data drawn from the results of this approach possess extensible applicability towards studies in naval ship system vulnerability, flow optimization, network architecture, and other system analyses. Supplementary work on interfacing the LEAPS framework libraries with deactivation analyses has demonstrated the capability for generating deactivation diagrams from complex LEAPS ship system databases and paved the way for future incorporation of LEAPS into research work at Virginia Tech. / Master of Science / As the development of new ships becomes more technically complex due to the increased incorporation of redundant and interdependent ship systems, there is a greater need for advanced tools to support future ship system design. Ship operational capabilities rely on the resiliency of onboard systems in all situations, included damaged conditions, and require comprehensive design evaluation to identify weaknesses in system concepts. This thesis details the development of a computational approach to ship system analysis using precomputed deactivation diagrams for early-stage naval ship system design. Deactivation diagrams are a unique way of looking at the interconnectivity of system components and offer a consolidated view of complex network architecture to significantly simplify and accelerate subsequent analyses. Developments in computational algorithms for ship system connectivity presented in this thesis aid in the automated development of deactivation diagrams and support system flow and vulnerability analyses with particular regard to ongoing work on the Virginia Tech (VT) Naval Ship Design Concept and Requirements Exploration (C&RE) process. Additional thesis development work referencing the U.S. Navy’s Leading-Edge Architecture for Prototyping Systems (LEAPS) database framework has demonstrated the capability for generating deactivation diagrams from complex LEAPS ship system databases and paved the way for future incorporation of LEAPS into research work at VT.

With introduction of information technology, the role of human resources management has transformed from traditional administrative affairs to strategic partners. Each enterprise, whether small or large, can not be divorced from the management of human resources. Finding proper talents; retaining and training employees for enterprises to maintain a strong vitality; providing effective supports to human resources etc. are important issues that human resources management currently needs to face. An ideal human resources management system must not only meet the needs of enterprises, but also be adaptable to the environment¡¦s change. Today, most human resources management systems on the market are in the form of packages and process-oriented; therefore, they have difficulties to cope with the frequently changed environment. As the saying goes, "Know both your opponent and yourself ever victorious", architecture-oriented construction of a system becomes the beacon to many enterprises so that they have a better grasp of the effective integration of resources, in order to create the maximum corporate value. Architecture-oriented human resource management model, abbreviated as AOHRMM, includes enterprise architecture and software architecture, which not only describes enterprise behaviors in terms of interactions among enterprise structures, but also fully applies information technology and system integration. From analysis to design, through macro to micro of architecture-oriented characteristics, AOHRMM is able to complete the construction of enterprise systems with consistency and standardization. Also with communication capabilities of architecture framework, AOHRMM makes all processes transparent, so that enterprise strategies, personnel, and any system all have a consistent direction and goal. In addition to combining resources to achieve the mission, AOHRMM is vigorous with rapid response and flexibility to adjust in consistently changing environment.

With the increasing availability of storage and computing power, Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) has gained more and more significance in practice over the last decade. This diploma thesis aims to develop a reference architecture which can be utilised to provide LSA based applications in a distributed system. It outlines the underlying problems of generation, processing and storage of large data objects resulting from LSA operations, the problems arising from bringing LSA into a distributed context, suggests an architecture for the software components necessary to perform the tasks, and evaluates the applicability to real world scenarios, including the implementation of a classroom scenario as a proof-of-concept. (author's abstract) / Series: Theses / Institute for Statistics and Mathematics

In today's economics, medium and large-size companies are trying to gain a competitive advantage from specialization and centralization of supporting services. This trend affects also areas of enterprise architecture and integration where they establish particular teams to support the disciplines in regular manner. Despite a lot of research activities oriented towards these topics, there are only a few focusing on organizational aspects and cooperation between enterprise architecture and integration teams. As the companies are on different levels of the maturity in both areas and focusing on different aspects of architecture and integration, there is no simple solution that could provide detailed guidelines for establishing the right cooperation approach. Goal of this dissertation is to propose a cooperation model for architecture and integration teams that should make cooperation between such teams more efficient. Integral part of the dissertation is to verify the model in real environment. The model is built on top of integration activities performed either in enterprise architecture or integration teams or both. These activities are categorized into particular integration areas and relations are identified between integration areas and architecture areas defined according to TOGAF architecture framework. The resulting model is then being used to depict various kind of cooperation between architecture and integration teams based on the companys' integration goals. Verification of the model is performed in financial enterprise in two cases and confirms the benefits of the model.

MBSE-Model-Based Systems Engineering wird als vielversprechender Ansatz gesehen, die steigende Komplexität heutiger Produktentwicklungsprozesse beherrschbar zu machen. Bei der Einführung und Umsetzung von MBSE existieren jedoch hohe Einstiegshürden, insbesondere, wenn formale Modellierungssprachen wie SysML für Modellierungsaktivitäten verwendet werden. Gleichzeitig bieten formale Modellierungssprachen jedoch Vorteile bei der Ermöglichung einer domänenübergreifenden Kommunikation und dem Informationsaustausch. Dieser Beitrag beschreibt einen Ansatz zur nutzer- und aufgabengerechten Unterstützung von Modellierungsaktivitäten mittels formaler Modellierungssprachen im Kontext des MBSE. Ziel des Ansatzes ist es, die Modellierung auf die Bedarfe und Aufgaben einzelner Anwender bzw. deren Rolle im Produktentwicklungsprozess zu fokussieren und somit einen gezielteren Zugang zur Modellierung zu ermöglichen. Hierzu werden Ansätze aus dem Bereich Architekturframeworks zur Strukturierung von Modellen mittels Bedarfs-getriebener Sichten mit einer Aktivitäts-getriebenen Formalisierung von Methoden des MBSE kombiniert. Methoden des MBSE werden in einzelne Modellierungsaktivitäten unterteilt und diese mit Sichten aus einem Architekturframework, die die Modellierungsaktivität unterstützen, verknüpft. Somit wird einerseits eine klare Strukturierung des Modells nach Sichten und andererseits eine gezielte und eindeutige Durchführung bedarfsgerechter Methoden des MBSE ermöglicht.

In comparison with the ever increasing development of enterprise architectures and frameworks, reference architectures has yet to reach the same maturity level. This brings questions regarding definition, implementation and governance of reference architectures at different levels; Business, System, Technical. In this report, an in-depth analysis of the concept of reference architctures is made, focusing on the abovementioned attributes. The purpose of the report is to provide the reader with an insight on how reference architectures can be implemented in order to aid in the work of system development.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The internal and external interactions between the complex structural and behavioral characteristics of the system of interest and the surrounding environment result in unpredictable emergent behaviors. These emergent behaviors are not well understood, especially when modeled using the traditional top-down systems engineering approach. The intrinsic nature of current complex systems has called for an elegant solution that provides an integrated framework in Model-Based Systems Engineering. A considerable gap exists to integrate system engineering activities and engineering analysis, which results in high risk and cost. This thesis presents a framework that incorporates indefinite and definite modeling aspects that are developed to determine the complexity that arises during the development phases of the system. This framework provides a workflow for modeling complex systems using Systems Modeling Language (SysML) that captures the system’s requirements, behavior, structure, and analytical aspects at both problem definition and solution levels. This research introduces a new level/dimension to the framework to support engineering analysis integrated with the system architecture model using FMI standards. A workflow is provided that provides the enabling methodological capabilities. It starts with a statement of need and ends with system requirement verification. Detailed traceability is established that glues system engineering and engineering analysis together. Besides, a method is proposed for predicting the system’s complexity by calculating the complexity index that can be used to assess the complexity of the existing system and guide the design and development of a new system. To test and demonstrate this framework, a case study consisting of a complex district cooling system is implemented. The case study shows the framework’s capabilities in enabling the successful modeling of a complex district cooling system. The system architecture model was developed using SysML and the engineering analysis model using Modelica. The proposed framework supports system requirements verification activity. The analysis results show that the district chiller model developed using Modelica produces chilled water below 6.6 degrees Celsius, which satisfies the system requirement for the district chiller system captured in the SysML tool. Similarly, many such requirement verification capabilities using dynamic simulation integration with the high-level model provides the ability to perform continuous analysis and simulation during the system development process. The systems architecture complexity index is measured for the district cooling case study from the black-box and white box-perspective. The measured complexity index showed that the system architecture’s behavioral aspect increases exponentially compared to the structural aspect. The systems architecture’s complexity index at black-box and white-box was 4.998 and 67.3927, respectively.

Evidence of the interest in enterprise architecture (EA) is seen in the number of enterprise architecture frameworks (EAF) in existence. An EAF is responsible for the realisation of an EA, and therefore acts as a container for the terminology of EA. The lack of acceptance of terms and definitions, coupled with the phenomenon of the large number of EAFs, indicate a silo type understanding of what EA is, which leads to a lack of clarity in the conceptual foundations of EA. By following a design science research (DSR) approach, a conceptual artefact (an enterprise architectonic (EAt)) is created to address the lack of clarity in the conceptual foundations of EA thinking and practice. The EAt serves as a conceptual device to represent the fundamental understanding of EA in terms of concepts and their relationships. The content of the EAt is derived from applying a structured interpretation method (SIM) to three prominent EAFs (The Open Group Architecture Framework, the Department of Defense Architecture Framework and the Zachman Framework for Enterprise Architecture). The SIM’s results are an EA understanding that consists of an EA claim: EA is similar in intent to the enterprise as a worldview is to the world. It is supported by six EA propositions:  Proposition 1: EA’s underlying theoretical knowledge is in a pre-suppositional state.  Proposition 2: EA is a description of the structure of the systems of an enterprise.  Proposition 3: EA represents the enterprise in time-oriented architectures such as an as-is, to-be and has-been architecture.  Proposition 4: EA translates the values/strategy of the enterprise into operational systems appropriate to the information society.  Proposition 5: EA provides a means to manage decisions about the IT/IS management and implementation in the enterprise.  Proposition 6: EA captures a representation of the enterprise in the form of a model or set of models. The six EA propositions are analysed through the lens of Heidegger's equipment analysis, to produce a set of architectonic elements. These elements are arranged in the EAt to create a conceptual device to support the fundamental understanding of EA. / Centre for Applied Information and Communication / Ph.D. (Information Systems)

Evidence of the interest in enterprise architecture (EA) is seen in the number of enterprise architecture frameworks (EAF) in existence. An EAF is responsible for the realisation of an EA, and therefore acts as a container for the terminology of EA. The lack of acceptance of terms and definitions, coupled with the phenomenon of the large number of EAFs, indicate a silo type understanding of what EA is, which leads to a lack of clarity in the conceptual foundations of EA. By following a design science research (DSR) approach, a conceptual artefact (an enterprise architectonic (EAt)) is created to address the lack of clarity in the conceptual foundations of EA thinking and practice. The EAt serves as a conceptual device to represent the fundamental understanding of EA in terms of concepts and their relationships. The content of the EAt is derived from applying a structured interpretation method (SIM) to three prominent EAFs (The Open Group Architecture Framework, the Department of Defense Architecture Framework and the Zachman Framework for Enterprise Architecture). The SIM’s results are an EA understanding that consists of an EA claim: EA is similar in intent to the enterprise as a worldview is to the world. It is supported by six EA propositions:  Proposition 1: EA’s underlying theoretical knowledge is in a pre-suppositional state.  Proposition 2: EA is a description of the structure of the systems of an enterprise.  Proposition 3: EA represents the enterprise in time-oriented architectures such as an as-is, to-be and has-been architecture.  Proposition 4: EA translates the values/strategy of the enterprise into operational systems appropriate to the information society.  Proposition 5: EA provides a means to manage decisions about the IT/IS management and implementation in the enterprise.  Proposition 6: EA captures a representation of the enterprise in the form of a model or set of models. The six EA propositions are analysed through the lens of Heidegger's equipment analysis, to produce a set of architectonic elements. These elements are arranged in the EAt to create a conceptual device to support the fundamental understanding of EA. / Centre for Applied Information and Communication / Ph. D. (Information Systems)

This thesis deals with a field of information modeling and its relation to systems architecture. It is divided into two notional parts -- theoretical (first and second chapter) and practical (third and fourth chapter). First chapter explains the meaning of the term 'information model', compares it to the term 'data model' and then introduce its practical use in an enterprise modeling. It also defines the term of 'systems architecture' in its broad meaning and reduces it to three narrow meaning -- enterprise architecture, information architecture and information systems architecture, while it explains their relation to the information modeling. Finally this chapter provides the base for information model implementation methodology created later in the practical part of this thesis. Second chapter introduces architecture framework called TM Forum Frameworx specialized for a telecommunication services provider. It consists of three standards for business process, information and application architecture. The second one defines specific information model which is described partly in the second chapter and partly in the appendix B of this thesis. Third chapter describes the first of two contributions of this thesis - the information model implementation methodology. This methodology is applicable to any implementation of an information model. Three sections of this chapter contains diagrams and description of three phases of the methodology - pre-implementation phase, implementation phase and post-implementation phase. In the end of the chapter there is a table containing outputs of every single activity performed during all the phases. Fourth and last chapter then describes and evaluates real implementation of the information model from TM Forum Frameworx in the systems architecture department of an enterprise providing telecommunication services. This implementation based on the created methodology and its successful results then became the second contribution of this thesis.