Hardware Engineer

Definition

Hardware Engineer (a.k.a., Systems Engineer)

the role that is played when a person engineers the hardware components of one or more systems or applications

Classification

As illustrated in the preceding figure, Hardware Engineer is part of the following inheritance hierarchy:

• Type: Concrete
• Superclass: Engineer
• Subclasses:
  • None

Responsibilities

The typical role-specific responsibilities of a Hardware Engineer for each environment are to:

• Acquire commercially available hardware components (e.g., servers, networks, and network connection devices).
• Fabricate special-purpose hardware components.
• Install the hardware components into their environments.
• Connect the hardware components to form networks.
• Configure the hardware components.
• Test the hardware components.
• Maintain (e.g., upgrade) the hardware components.

Hardware Engineer typically inherits common role responsibilities from the role method component.

Expertise

To fulfill these responsibilities, hardware engineers should have the following expertise:

• Understanding of the system requirements and system architecture.
• Deep knowledge of hardware components.
• Deep knowledge of networks.
• A bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, computer science, or the equivalent.

Tasks

Hardware engineers typically perform the following role-specific tasks in an iterative, incremental, parallel, and time-boxed manner:

• Implementation Tasks (of Hardware Component Implementation):
  • Acquisition
  • Fabrication
• Integration Tasks (of Hardware Component Integration):
  • Installation
  • Configuration
  • Component Integration
• Testing Tasks (for Unit Testing and Hardware Integration Testing) :
  • Test Reuse
  • Test Design
  • Test Implementation
  • Test Execution
  • Test Reporting
• Quality Engineering Tasks:
  • Quality Control - Architecture Evaluation
  • Quality Control - Environments Evaluation

Hardware Engineer typically inherits common role tasks from the role method component.

Teams

Hardware Engineers typically perform these tasks as members of the following teams:

• Hardware Development Team
• Environments Team
• Evaluation Teams:
  • Architecture Evaluation Team
  • Environments Evaluation Team

Work Products

As members of these teams, hardware engineers produce the following work products:

• Hardware Component
• Associated unit and software integration test work products:
  • Test harnesses.
  • Test scripts.
  • Test suites.
  • Test cases.
  • Test data.
• Quality Work Products:
  • Inspection Report
  • Inspection Summary Report

Guidelines

• Include this role in the endeavor-specific process only if the application to be produced includes hardware.
• This role typically inherits the common team guidelines from the roles method component.