Impact Analysis

Kind: activity

Layer: Evolution Principles

Record: architecture:impact-analysis

Severity: recommended

Scope: change, dependency graph, API

Canonical: Ontology

The activity of tracing a change through the dependency graph to find every consumer it affects.

Listed in Architecture principles, after Code Review and before Gap Analysis.

Requires

• Dependency Graph
• Contracts

Reinforces

• Change Safety

Enables

• Regression Scope Selection

Conflicts with

• Blind Change

In tension with

• Analysis Overhead

Tensions

• Impact Analysis / Analysis Overhead

Violated by

• Blind Change

Refactored by

• Unit Tests

Severity

• recommended

Category

• Architecture Review / Evolution / Governance Artifacts

Enabled by

• Causal Dependency

Linked from

• The plan is a graph
• Moves and renames
• A system is a graph
• Causality / Ordering / Distributed Time
• Architecture Review Evolution Governance
• Core Vocabulary
• Correctness / Determinism / Verification
• Severity levels
• The resolutions