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| Criterion |  Decision Making Constraint Analysis |  Architecture ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs) |  Architecture C4 Model |
|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | 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. | 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. | The C4 Model makes a system legible across several resolution levels, from context down to code. It suits situations where different audiences need to understand the same architecture from different altitudes. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Medium | Low |
Timedifferent | 30-90 min | 2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional | 1-4 h |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | Designers, developers as users, and facilitation | 1-5 |
Formatsame | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Constraint List, Hard/Soft Classification, Option Impact Notes, Decision Boundaries | Prioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisions | Context Diagram, Container Diagram, Component Diagram |
Tagsno overlap | ConstraintsDecisionPlanningOptions | ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks | ArchitectureCommunicationVisualization |
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