13.1 The TOGAF Content Framework and Enterprise Metamodel
Key Takeaways
The Content Framework structures the Architecture Description, while the Enterprise Metamodel defines the entity types appearing in models and the relationships between them.
The TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel is the basis for an organization-specific metamodel developed in the Preliminary Phase; architects may omit irrelevant entities and add new ones.
TOGAF 10 metamodel entities include Actor, Role, Organization Unit, Business Capability, Value Stream, Business Service, Function, Process, Data Entity, Application Service, Technology Service, and logical and physical data, application, and technology components.
An Actor is a person, organization, or system that has a role that initiates or interacts with activities; a Role is the part it plays, and one actor may have several roles.
Logical components are implementation-independent and physical components realize them with particular products, mirroring Architecture versus Solution Building Blocks.
13.1 The TOGAF Content Framework and Enterprise Metamodel
Architecture Content is one of the six Level 1 areas tested in Part 1 (5 of the 40 questions), and the Level 2 outcomes expect you to understand the Architecture Content Framework. The 10th Edition presents this material as the TOGAF Content Framework and Enterprise Metamodel. Many older study notes still teach the TOGAF 9 "Content Metamodel" with a mandatory core and six optional extension modules. That structure no longer appears in the 10th Edition text, so learn the current model below.
Two Ideas: Content Framework and Enterprise Metamodel
The TOGAF Standard, 10th Edition separates two related concepts:
- The Content Framework defines a categorization framework used to structure the Architecture Description: the work product that expresses an architecture and the collection of models that describe it. It explains how deliverables, artifacts, and building blocks relate to the ADM phases (Section 13.2).
- The Enterprise Metamodel defines the types of entities that appear in the models describing the enterprise, and the relationships between those entities.
TOGAF gives three reasons an Enterprise Metamodel is valuable. It provides consistency across architecture descriptions. It gives a completeness check for any modeling language or tool metamodel proposed for use in the enterprise: how completely does it handle the entity types, attributes, and relationships the enterprise needs? And it supports the traceability that impact analysis depends on.
An Example
TOGAF's own illustration: one entity type in an Enterprise Metamodel might be Role. The enterprise's Business Architecture models then contain instances of Role such as Teller, Pilot, Manager, Volunteer, Customer, or Firefighter. The metamodel defines the type; the models hold the instances.
Developing the Organization-Specific Metamodel
The TOGAF Library includes a foundation-level TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel capturing the entities and relationships likely to be found in most enterprises. It is meant as the basis for an organization-specific metamodel, developed when the EA Capability is established in the Preliminary Phase:
- Architects may leave out entities and relationships that are not relevant.
- Architects may add entities and relationships that the enterprise needs.
- TOGAF stresses that the entity types and relationships are specific to each enterprise, and that developing a high-quality metamodel is an important part of establishing the EA Capability.
The tailored metamodel is held in the Architecture Metamodel area of the Architecture Repository and is part of the Tailored Architecture Framework. Using the Enterprise Continuum, resources range from the most general (Foundation) to the most specific (Organization-Specific); the TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel is a foundation-level asset that each enterprise specializes.
The Entities of the TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel
TOGAF 10 lists the following metamodel entities. Grouping them by area makes them easier to remember:
| Area | Entities |
|---|---|
| Motivation and strategy | Driver, Goal, Objective, Measure, Course of Action, Principle, Requirement, Constraint, Assumption |
| Business | Actor, Role, Organization Unit, Business Capability, Capability, Value Stream, Business Service, Function, Process, Event, Control, Product, Business Information, Contract, Service Quality, Location |
| Data | Data Entity, Logical Data Component, Physical Data Component |
| Application | Application Service, Logical Application Component, Physical Application Component |
| Technology | Technology Service, Logical Technology Component, Physical Technology Component |
| Implementation and migration | Gap, Work Package |
Definitions Worth Memorizing
- Actor: a person, organization, or system that has a role that initiates or interacts with activities.
- Role: the usual or expected behavior of an actor, or the part somebody or something plays in a particular process or event; an actor may have a number of roles.
- Business Capability: a particular ability that a business may possess or exchange to achieve a particular purpose. Capability is the general-purpose term: an ability that an organization, person, or system possesses.
- Function: a set of business behaviors based on a chosen set of criteria, usually close-coupled to organizational units.
- Process: a sequence of activities that together achieve a specified outcome; it can be decomposed into sub-processes and can show the operation of a capability or service at the next level of detail.
- Business Service: supports the business by encapsulating a unique element of business behavior.
- Application Service: the automated elements of a business service.
- Logical Application Component: an encapsulation of application functionality, definable by the services it offers and the data it maintains, independent of implementation and technology. A Physical Application Component realizes it with functionality that may be hired, procured, or built.
- Logical Data Component: a data structure composed of logically related data entities. A Physical Data Component realizes it in the format or schema a particular technology requires.
- Logical Technology Component: an implementation-independent encapsulation of technology services. A Physical Technology Component realizes it using a particular technology product.
- Technology Service: a technical capability required to provide enabling infrastructure that supports the delivery of applications.
- Objective: an organizational aim declared in a SMART way.
- Requirement: a quantitative statement of business need that must be met by a particular architecture or work package.
- Constraint: an external factor that prevents an organization from pursuing particular approaches to meet its goals.
- Gap: a statement of difference between two states, used in gap analysis.
- Work Package: a set of actions identified to achieve one or more objectives for the business; it can be part of a project, a complete project, or a program.
Distinctions the Exam Likes
| Pair | Distinction | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Actor vs. Role | The actor is who or what acts; the role is the part it plays | Jane Smith (actor) acts as Chief Underwriter and as Compliance Reviewer (roles) |
| Function vs. Process | A function groups business behavior by chosen criteria, usually aligned to organization units; a process is a sequence of activities achieving an outcome | Accounts Payable (function) versus Validate Invoice and Pay Supplier (process) |
| Business vs. Application Service | Business services encapsulate business behavior; application services are their automated elements | Currency Exchange (business service) versus FX Rate Lookup (application service) |
| Logical vs. Physical component | Logical is implementation-independent; physical is a realization using particular products or schemas | "Customer Relationship Management" (logical application component) versus a specific CRM product deployment (physical) |
| Requirement vs. Constraint | A requirement states a business need to be met; a constraint is an external factor limiting the approaches available | "Process 10,000 claims per hour" versus "Customer data cannot leave the EU" |
The logical/physical split mirrors Architecture Building Blocks and Solution Building Blocks. Logical components describe what is needed independent of product; physical components describe the chosen realization.
How the Metamodel Supports the ADM
The metamodel gives the ADM a consistent vocabulary. Phase A artifacts relate drivers, goals, and objectives to stakeholders and capabilities. Phases B to D populate business, data, application, and technology entities and the relationships between them. Phases E and F use gaps and work packages to plan transitions. Because the entities are related, an architect can trace a change in a business objective through capabilities and services to the application and technology components affected. This traceability is what makes catalogs, matrices, and diagrams consistent with one another.
Common Exam Traps
- Studying TOGAF 9 extension modules. The 10th Edition text describes one TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel to be tailored, not a core plus six optional modules.
- Adopting the metamodel unchanged. TOGAF expects an organization-specific metamodel: drop what is irrelevant, add what the enterprise needs.
- Confusing Actor and Role, or Function and Process.
- Treating logical components as products. Product names belong to physical components and Solution Building Blocks.
A lead architect wants every project to model every entity in the TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel exactly as published, from day one. What does the TOGAF Standard, 10th Edition advise?
Use the published metamodel unchanged on every project, because tailoring it would break conformance with the TOGAF Standard
Use it as the basis for an organization-specific metamodel set in the Preliminary Phase, leaving out irrelevant entities and adding needed ones
Write a completely new metamodel from scratch, since TOGAF's entities are examples that are not intended for practical use
Choose two of the six TOGAF extension modules and discard the core, so each project models only the entities it actually needs
In the TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel, what distinguishes a Function from a Process?
A Function groups business behavior by chosen criteria, usually aligned to organization units; a Process is a sequence of activities achieving an outcome
A Function is always automated by an application, while a Process is always performed manually by people in the business
A Function represents the external actors that interact with the enterprise, while a Process represents the technology nodes that support them
A Function is modeled only in Phase D Technology Architecture, while a Process is modeled only in Phase B Business Architecture
A team records "Customer Relationship Management: manages customer profiles and interactions, independent of any product" and separately "Vendor X CRM, cloud edition, configured for the retail division". How do these map to TOGAF Enterprise Metamodel entities?
Both are Physical Application Components, because each describes CRM software that the enterprise uses or plans to use
The first is a Business Capability and the second is a Technology Service that supports it on the cloud platform
The first is a Logical Application Component and the second is a Physical Application Component that realizes it
The first is a Work Package that will deliver CRM, and the second is the Gap that the work package will close
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.