IT Infrastructure Architecture

Question: Discuss how you can automate an existing company's method of payment in its IT infrastructure. Identify positive and negative aspects of the selected model in relation to the operational health of an organization. Answer: Enterprise Architecture Enterprise architectures possess a unique feature to assess the alignment of the organization with the operational and managerial levels of the company. It is basically a picture of the future state roadmap in the political, managerial, technological and operational domains. They form the blueprints of systematically defining the current and the desired state of the organization. This architecture forms the one stop solution to many of the IT problems. There are many frameworks and models that are practiced and implemented in the industry each having its own strengths and weaknesses. Some of the major enterprise architecture models are Zachman Framework, Open Group Architectural Framework, Garter Methodology, and Federal Enterprise Architecture (Winter, 2006). There can be use of an independent framework or architecture or blended methodology to adjust with the changes. TOGAF is one of the enterprise architecture that is popularly implemented in the organizations. It has major components as Business Architecture, Application Architecture, Technical Architecture and Data Architecture. All of these elements combine to paint a clear picture of the landscapes of architectures in a way of informed decision making. TOGAF can also be blended with Zachman to over the problems and issues in the field of IT such as complexity, cost, critical information, matching market trends etc. The model is highly beneficial for the development of broad range of IT architectures enabling design and evaluation for the reduction of cost based over the architecture framework. Architecture Development Method is for the process definition of the business needs of the company in a neutral format. This framework also embodies concept of enterprise continuum to reflect range of abstraction in the process of development. It is designed to be flexible so that it may be integrated with the number of other types and models of frameworks of enterprise architecture. The greatest advantage is its easy accessibility and free resource availability (Urbaczewski, 2006). If an organization requires a boundary less information flow then the best model can be TOGAF for implementation of the structures within the enterprises. There can be assurance of the design and implementation procurement specifications as the amount of risk is reduced exponentially. It de-mystifies the architecture developme nt process by adding value and enabling the users to build a genuine system based platform for addressing business needs. It is rich in the technical layers and provides a wealth of reference material in the open framework. There are however, some of the major disadvantages too can be overcome by blending this architecture model and framework with other models. There is a need to strengthen the top three layers of implementation in the TOGAF (Jonkers, 2006) model. Any artifacts used in the model cannot be reused as they are ready made. Also, there are no standard templates provided for the entire domain to implement it in the form of block diagram. Also, it is difficult to learn it in the first go without extensive training. The payment process of the company can be implemented in the IT infrastructure in the form of enterprise resource planning (ERP) system either in the cloud infrastructure or as an independent software solution. It is the cornerstone for back office process management. Automation in the operations of the organization is a much required revolution in the industry. The online payment option is very flexible and feasible which revitalizes the entire organizational process (Pollin, 1999). The electronic payment methods can be utilized in innovation for customers including credit and debit cards, value cards and e banking and innovations enabling online commerce such as smart cards, encrypted credit cards and e checks. References Winter, R., Fischer, R. (2006, October). Essential layers, artifacts, and dependencies of enterprise architecture. InEnterprise Distributed Object Computing Conference Workshops, 2006. EDOCW'06. 10th IEEE International(pp. 30-30). IEEE. Urbaczewski, L., Mrdalj, S. (2006). A comparison of enterprise architecture frameworks.Issues in Information Systems,7(2), 18-23. Jonkers, H., Lankhorst, M. M., ter Doest, H. W., Arbab, F., Bosma, H., Wieringa, R. J. (2006). Enterprise architecture: Management tool and blueprint for the organisation.Information Systems Frontiers,8(2), 63-66. Pollin, R. E. (1999).U.S. Patent No. 5,966,698. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.