Evaluation of the Modifiability of an Evolution System Using the ATAM Method

Software architecture is one of the main assets in development companies, for it enables the evolution of systems and the reuse of products and components. Nonetheless, some software-development companies do not have the proper definition, description, handling, or use of architecture, which leads to highly increase the maintenance cost, consequently inflicting the early malfunctioning of the product. Having said that, it is necessary to consider the architectonic evaluation in a way that allows to re-factorize the structure drawn from the risks and the satisfaction of the quality stipulations. On this article, the evaluation of the academic/administrative information system from the Instituto Tecnolgico Nacional de Mxico, campus Apizaco, called integral services system (Sistema de Servicios Integrales) (SSI), is presented, where the Architecture Trade-Off Analysis Method (ATAM) was applied to evaluate the modifiability in three architecture types: web service, customer and programmer, identifying the possible risks in the structure that may interfere with the resulting software product, presenting the evidence and the results gathered by the evaluations.