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Criterion
Paper illustration of two considered options leading to a decision record with a marked status and visible consequences.
Architecture
Architecture Decision Record
Design sheets and interface cards connect to jointly written pseudocode with highlighted unresolved questions.
Architecture
ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs)
Paper illustration for Constraint Analysis.
Decision Making
Constraint Analysis
Purposedifferent
An ADR permanently records an architecture decision with context, trade-offs, and consequence. It creates continuity for later changes because the decision path stays traceable.ARID examines how well developers can work with a technical design. It focuses on a part of the system that can still be revised, between the architecture overview and the detailed specification.When an initiative stalls, the limit often lies not in the idea but in hard or soft boundary conditions. Constraint Analysis separates these limits and shows which of them can actually be shaped.
Complexitydifferent
LowMediumLow
Timedifferent
15-45 min2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional30-90 min
Participantsdifferent
1-3Designers, developers as users, and facilitation2-8
Formatdifferent
AsyncWorkshop + asyncWorkshop + async
Outputdifferent
ADR File, Decision Log, RationalePrioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisionsConstraint List, Hard/Soft Classification, Option Impact Notes, Decision Boundaries
Tagsno overlap
ArchitectureRationaleDocumentationGovernance
ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks
ConstraintsDecisionPlanningOptions
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Methods with strong topical overlap with the current selection, not yet in the comparison.

Paper illustration of Request for Comments (RFC) with its method-specific working model.
Architecture
Request for Comments
Paper illustration for Argument Mapping
Decision Making
Argument Mapping