US Patent 7930321 Reference architecture framework

An architecture record can be created for a computer system that includes a plurality of computing devices, each having an operating system. The architecture record includes platform definition architectures each associated with one of the computing devices and the operating system of the computing device, domain reference architectures each associated with one or more of the platform definition architectures and a service performed by the computing device of each platform definition architecture, and channel reference architectures each associated with one or more of the domain reference architectures, wherein the computing devices associated with the one or more domain reference architectures are configured to communicate with each other while performing the respective services associated with the one or more domain reference architectures.