Gap Analysis

Gap analysis is a useful technique that can be used to determine the differences between two states of the architecture. It is typically performed between a baseline architecture and a target architecture, or between a baseline and any intervening transition architectures. Gap analysis is an important step that should be performed before a roadmap can be created, and solution options can be described and migration planning commenced. The gaps can be of three types:

Unintentionally Omitted
Intentionally Omitted
Not yet described

The gaps can occur in any of the architecture domains including: Business, Information, Application, Technology architectures. Typical gaps include things such as missing Business Processes, Redundant Facilities, Data not available at the right place and time, applications that are no longer required, new technology services or devices needed to support an application.

Enterprise Architect has a purpose built Gap Analysis Matrix tool that can be used to conduct gap analysis and to present the results to business and technical audiences. Any number of Gap Analysis Matrices can be created for any or all of the architecture domains and these can conveniently be included into high quality publications generated automatically from the model.

This section lists the main tools available in Enterprise Architect that can be used to perform Gap Analysis. There is also a wide range of additional tools that a modeler might find suitable when applying the technique in a particular context. The complete list of tools is available from the topics: Meet the Enterprise Architecture Tools and Additional Enterprise Architecture Tools.