The effective documentation of Architectural Knowledge (AK) is one of the key factors in leveraging the paradigm shift toward sharing and reusing AK. However, current documentation approaches have severe shortcomings in capturing the knowledge of large and complex systems and subsequently facilitating its usage. In this paper, we propose to tackle this problem through the enrichment of traditional architectural documentation with formal AK. We have developed an approach consisting of a method and an accompanying tool suite to support this enrichment. We evaluate our approach through a quasi-controlled experiment with the architecture of a real, large, and complex system. We provide empirical evidence that our approach helps to partially solve the problem and indicate further directions in managing documented AK.

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In the field of software architectures, there is an emerging awareness of the importance of architectural decisions. In this view, the architecting process is explained as a decision process, while the design and eventually the software system are seen as the result of this decision process. However, the effects of different alternatives on the quality of the system often remain implicit. In the field of software product families, the same issues arise when configuring products. We propose to use the proven expertise from COVAMOF, a framework for managing variability, to solve the issues that arise when relating quality attributes to architectural decisions.