Two things to keep in mind while choosing the right software architecture are your desired quality attributes and functionality. It is not always about the most popular or latest technology; rather, it is about whether it is able to bring you your desired result.
Following are the features that you must keep in mind while choosing an architecture pattern:
- Time to market
- Cost
- Number of current and future users
- Toleration time for system unavailability
- Level of isolation
Every software structure is composed of various software elements that do the job as a blueprint. Then to a great extent, the design teams use this software architectural pattern.
There are two things to keep in mind here: an architectural pattern is more of a reusable, general pattern that is used in problems that commonly keep appearing in software architecture, whereas a software architecture on the other hand is a process of converting the software characteristics such as scalability or flexibility, into a structured solution that meets both the technical and the business expectations.
What this basically means is that any software should be scalable, maintainable, and modular enough that if a business product owner wants you to adapt their business model quickly to the changing market, it should be able to be done.
What happens to a system without an architecture pattern?
Typically, when you change the structure or behaviour of any class, a ripple effect can be seen in multiple other classes where they would break. One of the best ways to find out whether your software is like that is using a tool to reverse the software design like a hex-ray which would study your class structures. Following is a list of the best architecture pattern:
1. Layered Architecture
Layer architecture is one of the most commonly used models by different enterprises. A unique feature of this model is that the layers of it are interconnected but not interdependent on each other. This is more of a conventional approach taken while designing any software.
What this does is for instance, if you want to say the switch from Oracle’s database to maybe SQL then due to the switch you may have to excel in the database layer but there will be no domino effect on any other layer, therefore making you avoid any crashes.
2. Microservices Architecture
Microservices is a self-regulating and independent codebase. A plus point for microservice is that it can be maintained and written by any small team of developers as well. It works in a way that since it’s an independent service, each service is responsible for the implementation of its related business logic. Each of these independent services is kept separated from each other on the basis of their domain nature and even belongs to a mini-microservice pool. This architecture is mostly leveraged by an enterprise mobile app developer, even more so for complex applications. It is best for any website with small components.
3. Event-driven Architecture
The way in which event-driven architecture works is that it builds a central unit that accepts all the data and then assigns it to all the separate modules which handle that particular type. When such data is given, it creates an “event” and is then assigned to that code which is delegated to that particular type. This type of architecture is able to improve the response time of any application and as a result leading to a better business outcome. It is best for user interface and IoT-based applications.
Even though these three architectures are brilliant and have very good outcomes, there are still many more choices out there. It is important to understand the pattern properly, because if not done then it can lead to inappropriate implications and designs.
