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Architecture diagrams are written in PlantUML and kept inside Markdown files alongside source code. The study describes the problem context, the new working method, and a questionnaire survey of software engineers two years after adoption. Most of the 48 respondents report success and benefits such as improved organization, clearer processes, better alignment with code, and usability, while citing manageable learning effort plus future challenges in maintenance and cross-team communication.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/adopting-the-c4-model-for-lightweight-architecture-modeling-an-experience-report/657505/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/adopting-the-c4-model-for-lightweight-architecture-modeling-an-experience-report/657505.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Emma Wilson","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-30","2026-10-26",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":19},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What new documentation approach did the company adopt for software architecture?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"The company adopted a lightweight modeling approach based on the C4 model and expressed architecture diagrams in PlantUML within Markdown files stored alongside the code in the same repositories.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How was the effectiveness of the new approach assessed?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Feedback was collected through discussions with responsible architects and a questionnaire survey among software engineers.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"What benefits and challenges did engineers report after two years?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"Engineers reported benefits including better documentation organization, clearer documenting processes, improved alignment with the code, and ease of use. Reported challenges included a manageable learning curve, PlantUML-related layout issues, and anticipated future difficulties in maintenance and communicating changes across teams.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},657505,1793136881,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":19,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":139,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":144,"read_time":145},3848291630094,"https://eur-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_085a072bc5b1113ac321206ff7593b45","Adopting the C4 model for lightweight architecture modeling – An experience report ⋆  \nRobbert Jongeling 1[0000−0002−1863−3987], Niels Jørgen Strøm2 , Lars Peter Torp Nissen2 , Martin Kitchen2 , and Jan Carlson 1[0000−0002−8461−0230]  \n1 M¨alardalen University, V¨aster˚as, Sweden  \n{robbert.jongeling,[jan.carlson](jan.carlson}@mdu.se)[}](jan.carlson}@mdu.se)[@mdu.se](jan.carlson}@mdu.se)[ ](jan.carlson}@mdu.se)2 Grundfos, Denmark {njstroem,lnissen,[mkitchen](mkitchen}@grundfos.com)[}](mkitchen}@grundfos.com)[@grundfos.com](mkitchen}@grundfos.com)  \nAbstract. This paper reports on experiences of migrating to a new way of documenting software architecture for embedded software development at a company developing software-intensive systems. A lightweight modeling approach using the C4 model for software architecture was adopted, where the architecture diagrams were expressed in PlantUMLand stored within Markdown files alongside the code. We describe the problem context and the new approach, and report on a questionnaire survey among the software engineers to elicit their experiences and opinions two years after the introduction of this way of working. The majority of the 48 respondents reported being successful in using the new way of working and see benefits in terms of the better organization of the documentation as stored alongside the code, a clearer process of documenting, better alignment with the code, and ease of use. Engineers report a manageable learning curve but foresee challenges in maintenance and communication of changes across teams working on embedded software, hardware and electronics.  \nKeywords: Software architecture modeling · C4 model · Adoption in practice  \n1 Introduction  \nOrganizations rely on various ways to document their software architecture, and these ways are not uncommonly guided by convenience and legacy. When change to the architecture documentation practice is needed, it may be challenging to choose an appropriate method among the many available options. In this paper, we provide an experience report of such a change at a company, not claiming a definitive best solution to a problem, but contributing to the body of knowledge that may support decisions about documenting architecture in similar situations.  \nThe context of this research is a long-running collaboration with the partner company, in which we have been working on ways to improve their software architecting practice. This paper reports on a change in the way of working implemented by the company two years ago, we describe the change and survey  \n⋆ This research was supported by Software Center [www.software-center.se](www.software-center.se).  \n2 R. Jongeling et al.  \nvarious stakeholders to map their experiences. The company develops cyberphysical systems and embedded software for these systems. Due to an increase in the required capabilities of these systems and a growth of variants ofthe products the company offers, the number of development teams in the company has also increased. Consequently, the previous ways of capturing the software architecture were deemed no longer sufficient. To address the shortcomings, the company has adopted a hierarchy of documenting the architecture following the C4 model for software architecture by Simon Brown [1] . This model consists of four layers: Context, Containers, Components, and Code. Entities at each layer are contained in entities in the above layers. The context level captures systems and people, the containers level shows the containers that constitute a software system of interest, and so on. In addition to adopting this hierarchy, the company has established new modeling guidelines for the various software engineering teams to create documentation in Markdown files, including PlantUML or “draw.io”diagrams, and store them alongside the code in the same repositories.  \nWe report on experiences of this solution two years after its introduction. We gather feedback in discussions with the ","cbCaicCTgIZ9TByi","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaicCTgIZ9TByi","pdf",316856,17,"English","# Introduction\n## Problem context\n# Background and motivation\n## Previous state and need for change\n# Approach and lightweight modeling\n## C4 hierarchy and diagram tooling\n# Evaluation\n## Questionnaire results\n# Discussion and reflection\n# Conclusion","[{\"question\":\"What new documentation approach did the company adopt for software architecture?\",\"answer\":\"The company adopted a lightweight modeling approach based on the C4 model and expressed architecture diagrams in PlantUML within Markdown files stored alongside the code in the same repositories.\"},{\"question\":\"How was the effectiveness of the new approach assessed?\",\"answer\":\"Feedback was collected through discussions with responsible architects and a questionnaire survey among software engineers.\"},{\"question\":\"What benefits and challenges did engineers report after two years?\",\"answer\":\"Engineers reported benefits including better documentation organization, clearer documenting processes, improved alignment with the code, and ease of use. Reported challenges included a manageable learning curve, PlantUML-related layout issues, and anticipated future difficulties in maintenance and communicating changes across teams.\"}]","Adopting the C4 model for lightweight architecture modeling - An experience report | PDF",1792981484,43]