Rating: 
Summary: Very good introduction to what an EA is all about
Review: Definitely a book to read to understand what an Enterprise architecture is and how to develop one. The book provides a step-based approach to get you to the point where a company can define its EA and how to evolve it. If you are looking for technical details you are in the wrong place. But if rather you want to understand the business benefits, then I doubt you'll find something easier to read on this subject.
Rating: 
Summary: I would love to hear from readers.
Review: Hi there, glad to see that my book is getting good reviews. I wrote it as a less technical guidebook about information systems architecture because I couldn't find anything that I could get business executives to read so they could understand this stuff. Would love to hear from readers as to how they have used the book and am available to answer questions.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: I have a business background an work in business development for a large Swiss ISP. We have a lot of development going on inhouse and furhtermore, need to integrate standard software. The book help me tremendously builing an understanding of what needs to be done to get order into our (creative) chaos. As a nice side effect I developed the glossary to communicate with the developers.
Rating:
Summary: Good overview
Review: I'm a finance director at a privately owned manufacturing firm. By reading this book, I was able to work with our CIO in developing the most cost efficient enterprise system for our firm. Although it may be a little too general for the techies, the book is great for managers needing guidance on their system needs.
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Summary: Conceptual thought meets pragmatism
Review: In the modern world of objects and components, Melissa remind's us that there is nothing new under the sun. The strength of this book, appart from being a very enjoyable read, is the reference to classification theory - how to associate and classify real world things within the problem domain. There are many dimensions to understanding architecture and this book exploits the Zackman Framework to present the various perspectives. An essence of realism is presented that crosses the boundary between conceptual and logical thought within the context of Enterprise Architecture - first class. These thoughts and idea's can be applied to the design of gateways and distributed systems in unique and powerful ways. If you suffer from spaggetti or stove-pipe systems and are looking for some new idea's - then this book will provide the medicine you need.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Overview for the Uninitiated
Review: Melissa Cook's work is best suited for the reader possessing little exposure to the overarching concepts concerning the use of modern information systems to support enterprise environments. Viewed from this perspective the book appears to be successful. The text covers several EA topics and issues in a simple, relatively non-technical manner. It also devotes, where possible, a portion of its space to the historical background concerning a particular topic. For the contemporary CIO or VP of information systems/technology who needs to wrestle with the demands of actually building an enterprise information architecture, the prospects for Cook's book may be different. Such readers may well want to search for texts that drill deeper into the issues and challenges to be faced when building or reengineering application architectures.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Overview for the Uninitiated
Review: Melissa Cook's work is best suited for the reader possessing little exposure to the overarching concepts concerning the use of modern information systems to support enterprise environments. Viewed from this perspective the book appears to be successful. The text covers several EA topics and issues in a simple, relatively non-technical manner. It also devotes, where possible, a portion of its space to the historical background concerning a particular topic. For the contemporary CIO or VP of information systems/technology who needs to wrestle with the demands of actually building an enterprise information architecture, the prospects for Cook's book may be different. Such readers may well want to search for texts that drill deeper into the issues and challenges to be faced when building or reengineering application architectures.
Rating:
Summary: Focusing on the Business Layers of Enterprise Architecture
Review: Melissa has produced an excellent, non technical book which outlines:
- the reasons for taking a business led approach to the development of Enterprise Architecture
- the potential benefits to business of investing in an Enterprise Architecture approach
- practical steps for doing it and overcoming common roadblocks Some readers will no doubt have wanted Melissa to move on to discussing the technical layers, but I feel this would have diluted one of the key messages of her book - that Enterprise Architecture is primarily a business issue focused on the company's core data and fundamental processes. Technology comes a distant second. If I have any criticisms, it would be on the suggested representations of the data and process models in the business layers of the architecture framework. My experience working with CEO's and business executives is that they automatically associate the look of these models as being "IT" and mentally switch off. In order to effectively market Enterprise Architecture and obtain the executive sponsorship necessary to drive it forward, some other ways of representing this information must be found. Representations that the executive team automatically regard as being in the business domain rather than in IT's. This varies from industry to industry and between organisations, but one example that has wide acceptance is the value chain model. Portraying the ballpark view process classes as a value chain does not corrupt the message and can help achieve the buy-in that is so essential. As Melissa rightfully stresses, a successful Architecture strategy requires the business executive taking ownership and ongoing control of these layers of the architecture framework.
Rating:
Summary: Keeping IT people/projects under management control
Review: Melissa's book, although "ancient" in web-time (1996), is bang up to date, stressing the importance of good management-led architectural design. In the current (summer 2000) snowball of interest in everything surrounding XML, her book deserves to be read by anyone interested in serious XML deployment, as it covers the "upstream" issues notoriously overlooked or sidestepped in the rush to early technology deployment. She rightly laments the lack of central authorities taking a lead hand in IT design and project management but offers a way forward using the Zackman Framework and some clearly mapped out targets and milestones. Having been hooked by the strength of her arguments for "why?", I felt a little shortchanged on the "how?" but sufficiently keyed up to look further afield, largely thanks to a very comprehensive bibliography.
Rating:
Summary: Keeping IT people/projects under management control
Review: Melissa's book, although "ancient" in web-time (1996), is bang up to date, stressing the importance of good management-led architectural design. In the current (summer 2000) snowball of interest in everything surrounding XML, her book deserves to be read by anyone interested in serious XML deployment, as it covers the "upstream" issues notoriously overlooked or sidestepped in the rush to early technology deployment. She rightly laments the lack of central authorities taking a lead hand in IT design and project management but offers a way forward using the Zackman Framework and some clearly mapped out targets and milestones. Having been hooked by the strength of her arguments for "why?", I felt a little shortchanged on the "how?" but sufficiently keyed up to look further afield, largely thanks to a very comprehensive bibliography.
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