Discoveries

Purpose

Discoveries exist so that engineering observations are preserved before they become architecture or standards. Without a place to capture them, observations made during real work are easily lost once the task that produced them ends — and the same engineering knowledge tends to be rediscovered, at cost, by the next team that encounters it.

What Is a Discovery?

A Discovery is evidence-based engineering knowledge captured from practical work: an observation, recorded with the evidence behind it, so it can later be evaluated and, if warranted, formalized.

A Discovery is:

• not an Architectural Decision — it carries no authority on its own.
• not a Specification — it does not define canonical guidance.
• not an implementation artifact — it is knowledge about engineering work, not the work's output.

Why Discoveries Matter

Organizations repeatedly rediscover the same engineering knowledge, because observations made during one initiative are rarely captured in a form the next initiative can reuse. AAOE preserves those observations as Discoveries so they become reusable organizational assets, available to inform future architecture rather than being relearned each time.

Relationship to Other Domains

• Case Studies — provide the evidence Discoveries are drawn from, and the domain to which validated Discoveries eventually trace back once applied in practice.
• Architectural Decisions — evaluate Discoveries and, if warranted, approve a direction in response to them.
• Specifications — formalize the authority an Architectural Decision created, not the Discovery directly.
• Reference Architectures — draw on accepted Specifications to describe reusable architectural patterns.
• Operating Model — defines the lifecycle and artifacts, including the Work Order, through which a Discovery's downstream Architectural Decisions and Specifications are eventually implemented.

Discovery Journey

Observation
        ↓
Discovery
        ↓
Validation
        ↓
Architectural Decision
        ↓
Specification
        ↓
Reference Architecture
        ↓
Case Study

Case Studies also generate new observations, so this journey is iterative rather than linear: applying a Specification or Reference Architecture in practice produces the next generation of observations, which may in turn become new Discoveries.

Governance

Discoveries carry no authority by themselves. They are evidence, not approval. Authority comes only after validation through AAOE governance — an Architectural Decision that evaluates the Discovery and, if accepted, grants it standing.

Relationship with Discovery Lifecycle

This Introduction describes the purpose of the Discoveries domain: why it exists, what a Discovery is, and how it relates to the rest of AAOE. The Discovery Lifecycle specification defines the lifecycle governing individual Discovery records — their sources, states, and criteria. This document does not duplicate that lifecycle; it introduces the domain the lifecycle governs.

Future Evolution

This domain is expected to expand as engineering knowledge is validated through future AAOE projects, including the individual Discovery records that formalize the observations already summarized in existing Case Studies.