Module
Module 1 of 6Lesson 1 of 1~3 min

Course overview

A system design course for product managers who need to discuss technical choices with their engineers without acting as the architect. You learn to read a diagram, put numbers on what the system must guarantee, and surface risks and trade-offs, ending with a full review of your own product.

Take this lesson: your first course is freeSee the full syllabus

Lesson objective

By the end of this overview, you will know what you will be able to do (read an architecture and challenge it with the team), the deliverable you will produce on your own product and which five modules get you there.

Topics covered

  • system design for product managers
  • software architecture
  • architecture review
  • technical product manager

Where it fits

Overview

What will I be able to read and challenge by the end of this course, and in what order?

Lessons in this module

  1. Course overview (this lesson)

What you will learn in the course

This lesson is part of the course Read and challenge a technical architecture

  • Read an architecture diagram (context and container levels of the C4 model) and spot its components, flows, boundaries and gray areas.
  • Turn vague expectations ("fast", "reliable", "scalable") into measurable non-functional requirements, written as quality attribute scenarios.
  • Compare monolith, modular monolith and microservices, then synchronous calls and asynchronous processing, based on the team, the load and the consequences for the user.
  • Assess data choices (source of truth, transactions, replicas, consistency), scaling and caching, and spot the bottleneck of a user journey.
  • Assess dependencies on third-party services (composite availability, degraded mode, vendor lock-in) and a build or buy decision.
  • Frame an architecture trade-off, record it in an ADR and treat technical debt as a product decision.
  • Run an architecture review of your product or of a proposal, with ten questions, a risk register and explicit trade-offs.

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