C4 for the system analyst: how to bring order to microservice chaos

▤ Summary

This article explains how to use the C4 model to bring order to complex microservice architectures. It walks through the four C4 levels, from system context down to code, and shows how to document an e-commerce platform with services such as Auth, Orders, Delivery, Redis, and an API gateway. The piece also highlights diagramming practices, including sequence diagrams and architecture-as-code workflows with Structurizr DSL and CI/CD. It positions C4 as a practical approach for improving communication, documentation, and system understanding in modern software teams.

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