architecture-decision-records

An Architecture Decision Record (ADR) captures context, decisions, and consequences for major architectural choices. You need an ADR when establishing governance processes or documenting significant structural changes to maintain a coherent decision history across projects.

To create an Architecture Decision Record, use a standard template and populate the Context, Decision, and Consequences sections. After acceptance, update the ADR index to maintain a navigable decision graph across your project history.

Manage the Architecture Decision Record lifecycle using guidance for creation, review, updates, deprecation, and supersession. This lifecycle process keeps your decision graph coherent and prevents historical choices from diverging from implementation details.

Yes, you can link related Architecture Decision Records through reference and linkage features. This builds a navigable decision history across projects, connecting related ADRs to maintain context and track supersession over time.

The best way to maintain legacy architecture decisions is applying ADR lifecycle guidance for updates and supersession. This prevents legacy choices from diverging from implementation details by keeping the decision graph coherent and documented.

Architecture Decision Records become hard to maintain when created inconsistently, causing decisions to diverge from implementation details. Limitations arise without standard templates and lifecycle governance for deprecation and supersession to keep records coherent.