Top 12 Enable Architect articles of the year

One year ago, on September 15, 2020, Enable Architect took up residence on the World Wide Web. And quite a year it's been! The editorial team has supported architects publishing dozens of articles aimed at exploring enterprise architecture and the people who build it. Each author is part of our growing community of IT architects, helping to connect industry experts with each other through sharing their knowledge.

Cheers to everyone who wrote, read, and shared articles from our first year as a publication. Peruse this list of the most-read articles from Enable Architect's first year and revisit what we have created together. And if there are topics you want to know more about—or even to write about—please reach out to us at enable-architect@redhat.com.

1. 6 architectural diagramming tools for cloud infrastructure: Communicating a vision for cloud computing requires meaningful diagrams. Matthew Broberg shares a half-dozen tools that will help you visualize the complex reality of IT infrastructure.

2. An architect's guide to APIs: SOAP, REST, GraphQL, and gRPC: There are many strategies for data exchange. Bob Resleman's primer describes the four essentials.

3. An illustrated guide to 12 Factor Apps: The 12 Factor App methodology is an influential pattern to designing scalable application architecture. Bob Resleman explains what that means for enterprise architecture.

4. An architect's guide to DevOps pipeline: Continuous integration & continuous delivery (CI/CD): DevOps automation tooling is often discussed as a pipeline. Bryant Son gives insight into how CI/CD relates to your system architecture.

5. 6 must-read books for aspiring cloud architects: Cloud architecture is a different paradigm. Matthew Broberg offers some recommended reads to help you be ready for the new landscape.

6. Developer experience: an essential aspect of enterprise architecture: Considering the interfaces throughout an enterprise architecture will lead to broader adoption. Bob Resleman and Matthew Broberg provide a primer on how to develop a great experience.

7. Architectural messaging patterns: an illustrated guide: Bob Reselman teaches the essential patterns of message exchange architectures and routing methods used in technologies such as Redis, Apache Kafka, RabbitMQ, ZeroMQ, and IBM MQ. He also explains how these patterns can streamline communication between architects and developers.

8. Software architects: hard and soft skills needed to become a leader: Software architects are part engineers, part business leaders. Matt Shealy uncovers the recipe for how much of each you need to land a job.

9. Five steps to becoming an enterprise architect: The enterprise architect's role is critical in today's business world. Deb Donston-Miller outlines five steps to ensure you're positioned for success.

10. 5 essential patterns of software architecture: Anand Butanti describes the main architectural patterns used to create the software we all rely on daily.

11. What type of IT architect are you?: There are so many uses of the role "architect" that it's easy to get confused. Bob Reselman defines the most common ones.

12. Using a schema registry to ensure data consistency between microservices: Bob Reselman explains how to make interservice communication easier by using a schema registry.

As Enable Architect enters its second year, our editorial team is looking forward to connecting more with the community and helping you to learn the skills and tools you need to be successful. As the team works to grow our community, we're counting on you, the reader, to help guide us toward what matters most in the world of software architecture.

Now is also a great time for the team to reflect. If you have suggestions or comments for improving Enable Architect, please reach out at enable-architect@redhat.com.