Part 20: Element Lifecycle — Tracking Status from proposed to archived

This post continues from the nineteenth part. Architecture is not a static picture — elements are proposed, implemented, deployed, and eventually replaced. The status field in Bausteinsicht elements makes this lifecycle visible. Status Values Status Meaning proposed Newly proposed, not yet decided or started design In the design phase, not yet implemented implementation Currently in development deployed Live in production deprecated Outdated, should no longer be used — but still active archived Decommissioned, kept in the model for historical reference only Setting Status in the Model The status field belongs directly in the element: { "model": { "authservice": { "kind": "service", "title": "Auth Service", "technology": "Go", "status": "deployed" }, "paymentservice-v2": { "kind": "service", "title": "Payment Service v2", "technology": "Rust", "status": "implementation" }, "shop-monolith": { "kind": "system", "title": "Legacy Monolith", "status": "deprecated" }, "old-auth-session": { "kind": "service", "title": "Session-based Auth (legacy)", "status": "archived" } } } Elements without a status field are treated as unset. bausteinsicht status List all elements with their status: bausteinsicht status Output: Element Lifecycle Status ================================================== proposed (0): design (1): paymentservice-v2 [service ] "Payment Service v2" implementation (2): notificationservice [service ] "Notification Service" shop.checkout-v2 [component ] "Checkout v2" deployed (8): authservice [service ] "Auth Service" shop.api [service ] "Shop API" ... deprecated (1): shop-monolith [system ] "Legacy Monolith" archived (1): old-auth-session [service ] "Session-based Auth (legacy)" unset (3): eventbus [queue ] "Event Bus" ... Filtered by Status # Only elements in development bausteinsicht status --filter implementation # Only deprecated elements bausteinsicht status --filter deprecated JSON Output bausteinsicht status --format json { "summary": { "proposed": 0, "design": 1, "implementation": 2, "deployed": 8, "deprecated": 1, "archived": 1, "unset": 3 }, "elements": [ { "id": "authservice", "kind": "service", "title": "Auth Service", "status": "deployed" } ] } The summary object provides an at-a-glance distribution — useful as a dashboard metric. Lifecycle in the Context of Other Features Health Score bausteinsicht health evaluates deprecated and archived elements in the Deprecation category: If a deprecated element still appears as a source or target in relationships, that is a major finding (→ Part 19). LSP / Editor The language server displays the status as a CodeLens above each element (→ Part 9): // service | status: deprecated | views: 2 "shop-monolith": { ... } Overlay Status values can be exported as a metrics JSON and visualized as a heatmap (→ Part 12): Deprecated elements in red, deployed elements in green. Sprint-Based Workflow Point in Time Status Change Architecture decision made proposed → design Implementation begins design → implementation Production deployment implementation → deployed Replacement decided (ADR created) deployed → deprecated System decommissioned deprecated → archived Document status changes as Git commits: git commit -m "mark shop-monolith as deprecated (ADR-007)". Combined with bausteinsicht changelog (→ Part 7), this creates a complete architecture history. Example Model The example for this part (all status values from proposed to archived) is located at teil_20.jsonc. This is what the result looks like in draw.io (bausteinsicht sync): You can find the draw.io file here: teil_20.drawio Generated PNG files via bausteinsicht export --image-format png: Generated PlantUML diagrams via bausteinsicht export-diagram: What Comes Next Part 21: As-Is / To-Be — Define and visualize the target architecture directly in the model Part 22: find & show — Navigate the model and explore elements with precision Official documentation: User Manual · Tutorial on doctoolchain.org