[HN Gopher] A visual C4 model tool for your team
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A visual C4 model tool for your team
Author : JacobDesigns
Score : 46 points
Date : 2021-09-28 16:11 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (icepanel.io)
(TXT) w3m dump (icepanel.io)
| neonate wrote:
| For those who like me had no idea what C4 means (other than an
| energy drink, a workout powder, an explosive, and a Corvette, in
| that order, according to Google):
|
| https://c4model.com/
| wfhpw wrote:
| Don't forget the Colossal Clean Crawled Corpus [1] too!
|
| Came here thinking it was another neural network + data
| visualization tool.
|
| [1] https://ai.googleblog.com/2020/02/exploring-transfer-
| learnin...
| pachico wrote:
| I'm new to C4 but so far, after 5 mins read, I can't see anything
| you can't achieve with PlantUML. I'm surely missing something,
| though.
|
| To be honest, diagram-as-code is so powerful I can't be tempted
| by eye-candy. What is the game changer with C4 and all its
| editors (if more than this)?
| adamkl wrote:
| This (icepanel.io) is just a graphical editor (with some very
| nice functionality) for C4 Model diagrams: https://c4model.com
|
| The actual standard is quite light weight, which is its main
| selling point. The whole premise is that many teams find
| rigorous standards like UML and Archimate too heavy and thus
| resort to basic boxes-and-lines diagrams. C4 essentially says
| "take your boxes-and-lines and put full sentence descriptions
| on everything". Combine that will successive levels of detail,
| and you have the C4 standard.
|
| You don't have to give up diagrams-as-code because you can
| create C4 diagrams with PlantUML [0] or using the C4 specific
| DSL [1].
|
| [0] - https://github.com/plantuml-stdlib/C4-PlantUML
|
| [1] - https://github.com/structurizr/dsl
| pachico wrote:
| Thanks a lot, mate!
| simon_brown wrote:
| C4 model creator here ... in a nutshell, the C4 model is: 1. a
| hierarchical set of abstractions to describe software systems,
| and 2. a hierarchical set of diagrams to visualise those
| abstractions. Benefits include it providing teams with a
| lightweight common vocabulary to describe/visualise software
| architecture, with the resulting diagrams being "developer-
| friendly". It's also independent of any specific notation and
| tooling. My top tip is that you don't need to use all four
| levels ... the first two are usually sufficient for most teams.
|
| I agree, diagrams as code is very powerful, and that would be
| my recommendation for teams looking for tooling ... the
| Structurizr DSL being the tooling that I created specifically
| to create multiple diagrams based upon the C4 model, in
| multiple output formats, from a single DSL source file. You can
| see a demo at https://structurizr.com/dsl and there are more
| details at https://structurizr.org
|
| Some teams do like the familiarity of diagramming/modelling via
| a UI though, and that's where something like IcePanel fits in.
| JacobDesigns wrote:
| DAC has a lot of strengths for technical users and audiences,
| but it isn't accessible for everyone. Our focus is keeping
| everyone in the team up to date and on the same page about the
| system design and in line documentation in an accessible,
| simple way. Decisions get made all the time and (most) often
| aren't captured in places everyone can access. Simply
| understanding how the product works that you're involved with
| shouldn't be difficult. There is a table for comparison here:
| https://icepanel.io/c4-model#dac-table
| Terretta wrote:
| I don't understand, though. Since it's a model, why say
| "gitable=no" instead of having ability to have those "frozen
| sources of truth" git-committed?
|
| In fact, it's not clear to me, can I even get the model code
| out of this? I see "model export" but can't tell what the
| toolbox means from your visual tool.
|
| I _really_ want to use this, but only if it integrates back
| into the everything-as-code record. (I don 't even care if
| bi-directional for now, but it has to snapshot the model
| out.)
| victor96 wrote:
| What use cases do you have that need the model to be
| committed to the repository if it wasn't bi-directional?
| crucialfelix wrote:
| C4 is a language for describing systems. I use structurizr to
| catalog everything and to better understand the relationships
| and problems.
|
| It can then create multiple views. For instance focus on one
| component and filter which relationships to show.
|
| I end up with 8 or more views, a few of which are useful to
| highlight a problem or problematic dependency.
|
| It can export plantUML as well as SVG.
|
| plantUML is more open and more widely applicable. C4 is a
| process of cataloging.
| Dnguyen wrote:
| What is the diagram framework being used?
| victor96 wrote:
| Sorry I don't understand, what specifically do you mean?
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