“How do we get great architects, if they only get the chance to architect fewer than a half-dozen times in their career?” — Ted Neward
In April 2021, a team from Zemoso participated in the O’Reilly’s Architectural Katas event and received an honorable mention. This recognition is a testimonial to our product-dev mindset.
Kata, a Japanese word, means “form”. It is used to describe a detailed choreographed pattern in martial arts to be practiced alone: to memorize and perfect the movements that you would need to execute.
For a junior engineer, still learning how to design a competent product software architecture, a simple problem statement might appear complicated. It’s hard to figure out where to start, what tools/techniques to use, and how to bring it all together. Even with the help of an experienced architect, it’s incredibly hard.
Architectural Katas methodologies add method to that madness!
Think analogously to what kata means.
O’Reilly’s conference website says it best: “Architectural Katas are proven abstract exercises designed to maximize the architectural effort, minimize the unnecessary overhead, and complete all the critical elements that any architectural exercise should include: changing requirements, a customer, project constraints, deadlines, peers, and the review process.”
Similar to practicing katas in martial arts, Architectural Katas must also be practiced regularly. The goal is to inculcate the techniques of a kata in such a way that it can be executed and adapted under different circumstances, easily.
"The Architectural Katas were born out of a simple desire: software architects need a chance to practice being software architects, just as programmers need a chance to practice being programmers. Dave Thomas created the concept of the ‘Code Kata’ while watching his son at karate practice, and that turned out to be a popular concept: a series of exercises that programmers can attempt in a variety of different languages, as a way to help master the language.
A few years later, while contemplating what kind of workshop I could run at a Java/Open Source/Agile conference, I thought about combining Code Katas, but at a higher level. Some Google searches made it pretty apparent that nobody had tried this before, so… what the hell? Let’s give it a shot.The Architectural Katas ran for 18 months straight, and each time they ran, they were a huge success–most participants found them useful, regardless of skill level.
Experienced architects thought they were a great way to try something different; novice architects loved the chance to try something without the pain of failing; and senior developers who’d never really known what architecting was like found it an easy way to get a glimpse of the architecture exercise."
— From the creator of the Architectural Katas, Ted Neward
At O’reilly’s Architectural Katas — April 2021, there were a total of 41 teams that participated in the event. Neal Ford was the Program Chair. Emily Bache, Tanya Reilly, Mark Richards, Vanya Seth and David Bock were the event judges.
A couple of highlights about who were at the event:
Mark Richards is a hands-on software architect and a published author with several books on micro-services, software architecture, and enterprise messaging.
Neal Ford is a director, software architect, and “Meme Wrangler” at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy company with a focus on end-to-end software development and delivery.
The event had three parts spread over three days
1. Kickoff — Learn how Architectural Katas works, explore the problem.
2. Semifinals and architectural presentation — Learn how to present architectural plans, and identify the finalists.
3. Finals — Top teams present. Vote for your favorite team, and then winners are announced.
You can find more details about the event here.
The problem statement revolved around the issues a brown field monolithic application was facing. The task for the participants was to come up with a final architecture for the system and a migration plan for the current application to get there.
The judges liked and presented the following from our solution at the event to the rest of the participants.
.svg)
You can check out the solution the Zemoso team proposed here.
A version of this blog post was earlier published on Medium.
.png)
.png)
.svg)
.svg)
.svg)
.png)
.png)
.png)
%20(2).svg)
.svg)
.jpg)
.svg)
“How do we get great architects, if they only get the chance to architect fewer than a half-dozen times in their career?” — Ted Neward
In April 2021, a team from Zemoso participated in the O’Reilly’s Architectural Katas event and received an honorable mention. This recognition is a testimonial to our product-dev mindset.
Kata, a Japanese word, means “form”. It is used to describe a detailed choreographed pattern in martial arts to be practiced alone: to memorize and perfect the movements that you would need to execute.
For a junior engineer, still learning how to design a competent product software architecture, a simple problem statement might appear complicated. It’s hard to figure out where to start, what tools/techniques to use, and how to bring it all together. Even with the help of an experienced architect, it’s incredibly hard.
Architectural Katas methodologies add method to that madness!
Think analogously to what kata means.
O’Reilly’s conference website says it best: “Architectural Katas are proven abstract exercises designed to maximize the architectural effort, minimize the unnecessary overhead, and complete all the critical elements that any architectural exercise should include: changing requirements, a customer, project constraints, deadlines, peers, and the review process.”
Similar to practicing katas in martial arts, Architectural Katas must also be practiced regularly. The goal is to inculcate the techniques of a kata in such a way that it can be executed and adapted under different circumstances, easily.
"The Architectural Katas were born out of a simple desire: software architects need a chance to practice being software architects, just as programmers need a chance to practice being programmers. Dave Thomas created the concept of the ‘Code Kata’ while watching his son at karate practice, and that turned out to be a popular concept: a series of exercises that programmers can attempt in a variety of different languages, as a way to help master the language.
A few years later, while contemplating what kind of workshop I could run at a Java/Open Source/Agile conference, I thought about combining Code Katas, but at a higher level. Some Google searches made it pretty apparent that nobody had tried this before, so… what the hell? Let’s give it a shot.The Architectural Katas ran for 18 months straight, and each time they ran, they were a huge success–most participants found them useful, regardless of skill level.
Experienced architects thought they were a great way to try something different; novice architects loved the chance to try something without the pain of failing; and senior developers who’d never really known what architecting was like found it an easy way to get a glimpse of the architecture exercise."
— From the creator of the Architectural Katas, Ted Neward
At O’reilly’s Architectural Katas — April 2021, there were a total of 41 teams that participated in the event. Neal Ford was the Program Chair. Emily Bache, Tanya Reilly, Mark Richards, Vanya Seth and David Bock were the event judges.
A couple of highlights about who were at the event:
Mark Richards is a hands-on software architect and a published author with several books on micro-services, software architecture, and enterprise messaging.
Neal Ford is a director, software architect, and “Meme Wrangler” at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy company with a focus on end-to-end software development and delivery.
The event had three parts spread over three days
1. Kickoff — Learn how Architectural Katas works, explore the problem.
2. Semifinals and architectural presentation — Learn how to present architectural plans, and identify the finalists.
3. Finals — Top teams present. Vote for your favorite team, and then winners are announced.
You can find more details about the event here.
The problem statement revolved around the issues a brown field monolithic application was facing. The task for the participants was to come up with a final architecture for the system and a migration plan for the current application to get there.
The judges liked and presented the following from our solution at the event to the rest of the participants.
You can check out the solution the Zemoso team proposed here.
A version of this blog post was earlier published on Medium.
“How do we get great architects, if they only get the chance to architect fewer than a half-dozen times in their career?” — Ted Neward
In April 2021, a team from Zemoso participated in the O’Reilly’s Architectural Katas event and received an honorable mention. This recognition is a testimonial to our product-dev mindset.
Kata, a Japanese word, means “form”. It is used to describe a detailed choreographed pattern in martial arts to be practiced alone: to memorize and perfect the movements that you would need to execute.
For a junior engineer, still learning how to design a competent product software architecture, a simple problem statement might appear complicated. It’s hard to figure out where to start, what tools/techniques to use, and how to bring it all together. Even with the help of an experienced architect, it’s incredibly hard.
Architectural Katas methodologies add method to that madness!
Think analogously to what kata means.
O’Reilly’s conference website says it best: “Architectural Katas are proven abstract exercises designed to maximize the architectural effort, minimize the unnecessary overhead, and complete all the critical elements that any architectural exercise should include: changing requirements, a customer, project constraints, deadlines, peers, and the review process.”
Similar to practicing katas in martial arts, Architectural Katas must also be practiced regularly. The goal is to inculcate the techniques of a kata in such a way that it can be executed and adapted under different circumstances, easily.
"The Architectural Katas were born out of a simple desire: software architects need a chance to practice being software architects, just as programmers need a chance to practice being programmers. Dave Thomas created the concept of the ‘Code Kata’ while watching his son at karate practice, and that turned out to be a popular concept: a series of exercises that programmers can attempt in a variety of different languages, as a way to help master the language.
A few years later, while contemplating what kind of workshop I could run at a Java/Open Source/Agile conference, I thought about combining Code Katas, but at a higher level. Some Google searches made it pretty apparent that nobody had tried this before, so… what the hell? Let’s give it a shot.The Architectural Katas ran for 18 months straight, and each time they ran, they were a huge success–most participants found them useful, regardless of skill level.
Experienced architects thought they were a great way to try something different; novice architects loved the chance to try something without the pain of failing; and senior developers who’d never really known what architecting was like found it an easy way to get a glimpse of the architecture exercise."
— From the creator of the Architectural Katas, Ted Neward
At O’reilly’s Architectural Katas — April 2021, there were a total of 41 teams that participated in the event. Neal Ford was the Program Chair. Emily Bache, Tanya Reilly, Mark Richards, Vanya Seth and David Bock were the event judges.
A couple of highlights about who were at the event:
Mark Richards is a hands-on software architect and a published author with several books on micro-services, software architecture, and enterprise messaging.
Neal Ford is a director, software architect, and “Meme Wrangler” at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy company with a focus on end-to-end software development and delivery.
The event had three parts spread over three days
1. Kickoff — Learn how Architectural Katas works, explore the problem.
2. Semifinals and architectural presentation — Learn how to present architectural plans, and identify the finalists.
3. Finals — Top teams present. Vote for your favorite team, and then winners are announced.
You can find more details about the event here.
The problem statement revolved around the issues a brown field monolithic application was facing. The task for the participants was to come up with a final architecture for the system and a migration plan for the current application to get there.
The judges liked and presented the following from our solution at the event to the rest of the participants.
You can check out the solution the Zemoso team proposed here.
A version of this blog post was earlier published on Medium.
.svg)
.svg){kind=small}
.png){kind=small}
