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Criterion
Paper illustration for Fault Isolation.
Engineering
Fault Isolation
Design sheets and interface cards connect to jointly written pseudocode with highlighted unresolved questions.
Architecture
ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs)
Paper illustration of a calm four-quadrant Assumption Map with hypothesis cards and emphasis on important assumptions with little evidence.
Product Discovery
Assumption Mapping
Paper illustration of an assumption matrix with prioritized test cards
Decision Making
Assumption Surfacing
Purposedifferent
In technical failures, the visible symptom often gets mixed up with the actual cause. Fault Isolation narrows the fault space and progressively reduces which part of the system is truly affected.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 assumptions still sit unordered in the room, it weighs uncertainty against leverage. It makes visible which hypotheses should be checked first.Plans often contain assumptions that were never openly stated and remain dangerous precisely because of that. Assumption Surfacing makes these silent premises visible and prioritizes which of them carry the initiative or could sink it.
Complexitydifferent
MediumMediumMediumLow
Timedifferent
30-180 min2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional45-60 min45-90 min
Participantsdifferent
1-6Designers, developers as users, and facilitation2-82-8
Formatsame
Workshop + asyncWorkshop + asyncWorkshop + asyncWorkshop + async
Outputdifferent
Fault Isolation Map, Test Log, Excluded Hypotheses, Narrowed Fault AreaPrioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisionsAssumption map, Test backlog, Risk rankingAssumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan
Tagsno overlap
TroubleshootingDiagnosisEngineering
ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks
AssumptionsRiskExperimentsValidation
AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery
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