Towards an Understanding of Enterprise Architecture Analysis Activities

The connotation of the term of Enterprise Architecture (EA) analysis varies from context to context. Aiming at, in part, promoting the understanding and reducing the possible misconception of EA analysis, in order to characterize, classify, and distinguish the connotations of EA analysis, six interrelated types of activities are identified: (I) System thinking; (II) Modeling; (III) Measuring; (IV) Satisfying; (V) Comparing with requirements, and (VI) Comparing alternatives. The paper starts with the EA lifecycle management, and then addresses the main tasks in different stages in the EA lifecycle process. After that, the meaning of each type of activities and their interrelationships are discussed. The usage of the six types of activities is illustrated through several scenarios of EA analysis. The main contribution of the paper is twofold: first, it articulates that there is a broader variety of understandings of the term EA analysis than we could imagine; second, it provides the possibility and feasibility for researchers to explain and customize, i.e. for authors to clarify and for audiences to grasp, the meaning of EA analysis using certain combinations of the six activities.