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| Criterion |  Architecture Views and Beyond |  Architecture Request for Comments |  Decision Making Assumption Surfacing |  Architecture arc42 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | Views and Beyond organizes architecture into several views so no single diagram has to do everything at once. This makes it possible to choose the representation that fits the stakeholder's question. | An RFC clarifies architecture context, options, and consequences. It structures technical context, alternatives, tradeoffs, open questions, and review feedback, and captures the result as an RFC document, reviewer comments, and a decision rationale. | 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. | arc42 structures architecture knowledge so teams can document system, decisions, and risks consistently. The template builds a living understanding of the architecture instead of scattered notes. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Medium | Low | Low |
Timedifferent | 1-3 Tage | 1-3 Wochen vom Draft bis zur Entscheidung | 45-90 min | 1-2 Tage |
Participantsdifferent | 1-4 | 3-20 Reviewer | 2-8 | 1-4 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Architecture Views, Cross-view Notes, Rationale | RFC document, Reviewer comments, Decision rationale, Follow-up ADR or tickets | Assumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan | Architecture Document, Context View, Runtime View, Deployment View |
Tagsno overlap | DocumentationStakeholdersArchitecture | ArchitectureDecisionAsyncGovernance | AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery | ArchitectureDocumentationCommunication |