What's the best way to pick a software architecture pattern?

Layer architecture also known as n-tier architecture is widely adopted. It could be difficult and introduce some performance issues in some rare cases but the advantages to have a clean separation between layers are tangible in different way, from coding to test. Also, it is almost necessary as a baseline when implementing addictional design pattern like DDD

Layered architecture's significance is highlighted, with each layer offering a specific function and contributing to the system's overall structure. This organized approach facilitates iterative development and continuous refinement, ensuring a balance between design, functionality, and operational considerations.

One of the key considerations when designing a layered architecture is to establish a shared data model, ideally based on business domain concepts to ensure consistency when the various layers are communicating with each other. The function and responsibilities of each layer should be specified as explicitly as possible to ensure consistency when new services are added. This is particularly true for capabilities such as data validation. It is worth remembering that each layer will typically consist of multiple services and careful consideration needs to be made about the alignment of these services to business domains, resources, or line of business applications.

Microservice architecture suits best when you can clearly divide the solution into smaller use cases or business function. It helps in better reusability and scalability.

In the context of modern software design, microservices emerge as a pragmatic solution, enabling agility and scalability through modular components and streamlined deployment processes.

Whilst the benefits of a microservices architecture are clear, it is easy to underestimate the additional engineering and design effort required to implement a fully functioning microservices solution. Without good governance it can soon lead to a smorgasbord of technologies, designs and hidden dependencies that become more difficult to support and maintain.

The dynamics of event-driven architecture come to the forefront, fostering seamless communication between components and services. This approach enhances responsiveness and collaboration by allowing different parts of the system to interact efficiently based on events.

Event Driven Architectures provide a great deal of flexibility in a solution as new events, publishers and consumers can be defined as the requirements are elaborated. The use of cloud queue and notification technologies can provide almost limitless scalability. It does require good governance to ensure that events are well-defined and not subject to breaking changes (such as changes in data types, or event attributes being renamed or dropped). Additional design concerns are raised by using events, such as in-order processing, retries, duplicate detection, data consistency, race conditions etc.

This is also known as Clean or Onion Architecture ??. This architecture is applied at the application level, whether you're using event driven or request/response architecture for inter-app communication. In my experience this has given success when applied to an app that has a large feature set and has many hands committing code from a large dev team. It's meant to reduce change conflicts and allow easier maintenance of the code. Hexagonal Architecture is based on SOLID Principles. If your dev team can learn those principles first, then applying this architecture becomes easier.

it's working on bee hive concept where we will integrate different services or system using adapter. modular and multi protocol based integration are possible to achieve

When in the architectural phase (which is before choosing the implementing technology in the design phase), one of the biggest mistakes architects make is trying to apply design patterns as if they were assembling Lego pieces. Design patterns and "best practices" principles. They are not intended to be applied "as is". Every "best practice" and every design pattern is a set of principles for that "best practice" or design pattern. As an architect, you analyze the requirements, understand what the end result is to be now and in five years, then pick and choose from the principles within each "best practice" and design pattern to create an architecture that best fits the requirements over the whole SDLC.

Ao escolher um padr?o de arquitetura de software, é essencial considerar vários aspectos fundamentais. Primeiramente, precisamos entender as necessidades específicas do projeto. Isso envolve avaliar requisitos como escalabilidade e alta disponibilidade para determinar o padr?o mais apropriado. Em seguida, a complexidade do sistema desempenha um papel significativo na decis?o; sistemas simples podem se adequar bem a uma arquitetura monolítica, enquanto sistemas mais complexos podem exigir a flexibilidade dos microservi?os. Outro fator importante é a experiência da equipe. é preferível optar por padr?es e tecnologias com os quais a equipe já está familiarizada, a menos que haja tempo e recursos disponíveis para um treinamento adequado.

Start simple and small. Choose the most boring, easy and familiar tech stack to begin with. Watch for patterns that emerge as the product grows. Look for established architecture and design patterns that apply. Adjust your architecture accordingly. Don’t be shy of refactoring. Do not over engineer to begin with but don’t hesitate to make adjustments or big changes as the product grows and evolves

I’ll add that the best time to pick a pattern is when the team has full comprehension of the problem statement, can articulate different possible solutions and their trade offs and can further articulate the different architectural choices available to solve said problem. A suboptimal time is if an architectural pattern is chosen because that was the only known pattern at the time and a choice had to be made. This is akin to using a flathead screwdriver to remove a Phillips head screw without spending a few more cycles to evaluate what else is in the toolbox. If the team neither has nor understands the various architectural patterns that can be used to solve the problem, it is not yet ready to pick one.

Good software architecture is like a well-designed city plan – it ensures efficient traffic flow, organized structures, and room for growth

What ever it is...It should be loosely coupled and abstracted. Those principles will allow you to more easily shift implementations of subsystems reducing the cost of potential technical debt.

I think one of the biggest decisions is based on the skills of the team. Developing micro services sounds good, in theory, but you often end up with lots of monoliths instead of just one and the problem of trying to make changes continues. Do you understand the domain area? If not a layered approach may be best, as you can always decompose it later, as there should be good separation between layers but also between different domains on the same layer, so if you talk with Sharepoint and Oracle they should have their own separation. Don't pick a solution just because it sounds cool or new, pick the one that will work best for the current design but don't over-engineer.