Enterprise Architecture with a difference
The 8 factor approach	Return From Information (RFI)	Information First
Life Cycle of Intellectual Assets	Knowledge Scape	Information FrameWork (IFW)
History of Enterprise Architecture	Information Coaching	Information Obesity

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A History of Enterprise Architecture

The nature of Enterprise Architecture has changed enormously in its brief history. In the 1970s and 1980s it wasn't called Enterprise Architecture, usually going under the name Information Systems Architecture. In these early years, many enterprise architects called themselves information architects - a term that in recent years has the narrower focus on the WWW and web site design.

Enterprise Architecture
- broad and mighty,
with a long tail

Gradually the term Enterprise Architecture took hold. New architectural frameworks, methodologies, books and techniques were developed. In the 1990s we saw the arrival of reference models and other generic artefacts. The emergence of the Internet and ubiquitous computing required further changes.

Now, although it still has a strong technical orientation, Enterprise Architecture is as much concerned with people-led business transformation. Enterprise Architecture is concerned with the dependencies and links between an organization and its information technology infrastructure. It has become a discipline that helps to manage complex organizational change.

So what about the future of Enterprise Architecture?

Enterprise Architecture is now a broad and mighty discipline. Enterprise Architecture is an umbrella discipline that covers a vast range of topics, including informology, knowledge management, large-scale change or transformation, computer science, systems and complexity, artificial intelligence and knowledge based systems, workflow and business process modeling, human computer interface, linguistics, psychology, cognition, sociology and anthropology. (And that's only some of the areas it covers.)

But Enterprise Architecture also has a long tail, embracing a huge number of sub-architectures. These range from very technical architectures to ones with a more social orientation. It is probably impossible (and pretty boring) to come up with a definitive list, but the long tail spans Data Architecture, Information Architecture, Business Architecture, Organization Architecture, Application Architecture, Technical Architecture, Network Architecture, Security Architecture, Process Architecture, Information Architecture, IT Architecture, Governance Architecture, Solution Architecture, Storage Architecture, Software Architecture, and Information Systems Architecture.

In the future Enterprise Architecture will become even broader and mightier - even more of an umbrella discipline. And the tail will grow even longer.