Early evolution of the architecture of a system or a product line of systems is a low-cost risk reduction method for determining whether the system(s) will achieve its business and quality goals. The Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method (ATAM) is an architecture evaluation technique currently evolving at the Software Engineering Institute (SEI). The input to the ATAM consists of a system or product line architecture and the perspectives of stakeholders involved with that system or product line. The output of the ATAM is (1) a collection of scenarios that help specify the context of the system's or product line's use and the product line's evolution, (2) improved architectural documentation (usually), and (3) analysis results (in particular, a set of issues to consider, risks, and potential sensitivity and tradeoff points within the architecture). Currently, there are no generally accepted industry-wide standards for describing a system architecture, and ATAM evaluations are often tailored to the available documentation.

The Architectures Directorate of the C4I Integration Support Activity (CISA), Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence (OASD[C3I]) has defined a framework for architecture development, presentation, and integration to be used across the military services and defense agencies. This framework for Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) is becoming the required method for describing information systems with the Department of Defense (DoD) and other U.S. Government agencies. This report describes how various C4ISR products can be used in the context of an ATAM evaluation and their relative value for generating quality attribute-specific scenarios required for an ATAM evaluation.