The same concept applies for an architectural diagram: if it raises more questions than answers, the diagram is not well created. As per this wiki explanation, "it refers to the notion that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image or that an image of a subject conveys its meaning or essence more effectively than a description does". Current pitfalls when designing architectural diagramsīefore going deeper into possible issues, I would like to have an analogy to an English idiom which says "a picture is worth a thousand words". structure, elements, relationships, properties, principles) and across different stakeholders having various technical backgrounds and concerns. That’s why it is important that every architect or software engineer rely on several guidelines when creating architectural diagrams, since they are the common ground of communicating the application’s architecture over time (e.g. Nevertheless, diagrams must be self descriptive, consistent, accurate enough and connected to the code. All from an AWS, Microsoft and Google Cloud Partner. DoiT provides technology and cloud expertise to reduce cloud costs and boost engineer productivity. The true promise of the cloud with ease, not cost. In comparison to an architectural model which must be formal and standardized, the diagrams might not necessarily be formalized or follow a specific standard. I saw a lot of issues regarding inconsistency, fragmentation, and granularity of the rendered information and the look of the diagrams. In software architecture, such diagrams are created in compliance with views which are related to a specific viewpoint that could be part of a model, but in the current article I prefer to stick to the term architectural diagram and not be very formal all the other aspects are not intended to be covered here.īased on my experience as a software architect and technical trainer, there are a lot of discrepancies between projects and inside the project team from developer to developer in the way architectural diagrams are created. Kruchten 4+1, Rozanski & Woods, etc) or not, there is a need to document some parts of the application by creating diagrams. Whether we are following a formal architectural model (e.g. Additional concerns might emerge and could easilyĪt some point in time, in every software project we are involved in, there might be a need to create architectural diagrams. Modern architectures bring extra complexities which are reflected in the diagrams.We need to know how to efficiently proceed in such cases by still keeping consistency and robustness across architectural diagrams. As the system is evolving, maintaining diagrams up-to-date requires extra effort.In the process of creating diagrams, try to blend automatically generated with manually created ones in order to minimize the work, to illustrate different set of concerns and to cover multiple abstraction levels of the system.UML), but the misunderstanding of diagrams importance, relying on improper or inconsistent guidelines or even the lack of architectural education. In most cases, the real issues are not strictly related to using a less efficient Architectural Description Language (e.g.Creating consistent and meaningful diagrams brings clarity and consensus across different stakeholders. Designing architectural diagrams might not be an easy task it can be tricky or error prone, even for the simplest ones.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |