Faculty of Information Technology
Philadelphia University
Lecturer
: Dr. Moayad
Coordinator
: Dr. Moayad
Examiner: Dr. Samer Hanna
Software Architecture (721320)
Date: 22th November 2015
Department of Software Engineering
Examination Paper
Section: 1
Internal
First Exam
1st semester 2015-2016
Time: 60 Minutes
Information for Candidates
1.This examination paper contains 4 questions. The total is 20 marks.
2.The marks for parts of questions are shown in round brackets.
I. Basic Notions
Objectives: The aim of the question is to evaluate your knowledge and skills concerning with the basic concepts of Software
Architecture.
Question 1: (7 marks)
A) Circle the correct answer of the following: (4 marks, 0.5 mark for each)
1. What is pipes and filter style?
a) They emphasize on incremental transformation of data by successive components
b) It is used in UNIX family of the system
c) They return no state information
d) All of the mentioned
2) The architectural representations can enable communication among project stakeholders.
a) True
b) False
3) Data design actually begins during the creation of the analysis model, not the architectural model.
a) True
b) False
4) An architectural style encompasses which of the following elements?
a) Constraints
b) Set of components
c) Semantic models
d) Syntactic models
e) a, b and c
5) To determine the architectural style or combination of styles that best fits the proposed system, requirements engineering is
used to uncover
a) Algorithmic complexity
b) Characteristics and constraints
c) Control and data
d) Design pattern
6) Which of these steps are followed in architectural design process?
a) Analyze SRS
b) Evaluate Candidate Architectures
c) Select architecture and finalize architecture
d) All of the mentioned
7) Which of these are the content for SAD?
a) Product Overview
b) Architectural Models
c) Architectural design rationale
d) All of the mentioned
e) None of the mentioned
8) What does software architecture describe?
a) The system as a whole.
b) The system as a whole, its parts and how parts communicate to meet the system's goal.
c) The system's parts and how they are built.
d) The system's parts and how they behave at run-time.
B) What are the main features of Domain-Specific Software Architectures? (1.5 marks)
C) What are the basic Benefits of software architectural styles? (1.5 marks)
II. Familiar Problems Solving
Objectives: The aim of the question is to evaluate your basic knowledge of the key aspects of the lectures material and your
ability to solve familiar problems.
Question 2 (6 marks – 1.5 Marks for each)
A- For the following model determine (components, connectors, interfaces, and configuration)
B- Consider the following diagram:
1- Specify the software architectural style.
2- What are the properties of the specified style?
C- For the following diagram determine its software architecture style and its advantages:
D- For the following diagram determine its software architecture style and its disadvantages:
Question 3 (4 marks)
Consider a system that includes a Web server and two data base servers. Both data base servers are identical; the first acts as a main
server, and the second acts as a redundant back-up in case the first one fails.
Users use Web browsers to access data through the Web server. They also have the option of using a proprietary client that accesses
the data bases directly.
Draw a client/server descriptive software architecture diagram representing the hardware/software
mapping of this system.
III. Unfamiliar Problems Solving
Objectives: The aim of the question is to evaluate your knowledge of the key aspects of the lectures material and your ability
to solve unfamiliar problems.
Question 4 (3 marks)
“Assume you are developing an online system for managing bank accounts for mobile customers. A major design issue is how to
provide access to the accounts when the customer cannot establish online connections. One proposal is that accounts are made
available on the mobile computer, even if the server is not up. In this case, the accounts show the amounts from the last connected
session.”
a) What software architecture design you will use? Justify your answer.
b) Draw a descriptive software architecture diagram (according to “a”) representing the hardware/software mapping of
this application.