Eberhard Wolff
Head of Architecture, SWAGLab
Head of Architecture, SWAGLab
Kaiserslautern, Germany
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Eberhard Wolff has 20+ years of experience as an architect and consultant - often on the intersection of business and technology. He is Head of Architecture at SWAGLab. As a speaker, he has given talks at international conferences and as an author, he has written more than 100 articles and books e.g. about Microservices and Continuous Delivery. His technological focus is on modern architectures – often involving Cloud, Domain-driven Design, and Microservices.
Eberhard Wolff ist Head of Architecture bei SWAGLab und arbeitet seit mehr als zwanzig Jahren als Architekt und Berater, oft an der Schnittstelle zwischen Business und Technologie. Er ist Autor zahlreicher Artikel und Bücher, u.a. zu Continuous Delivery und Microservices, trägt regelmäßig als Sprecher auf internationalen Konferenzen vor und streamt wöchentlich zum Thema Software-Architektur. Sein technologischer Schwerpunkt sind moderne Architektur- und Entwicklungsansätze wie Cloud, Domain-driven Design und Microservices.
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Sociotechnical Architecture Reviews: Understanding Teams, Not Just Artefacts en
At first glance, software architecture appears to be a purely technical artefact. So it should be possible to review it solely as such—or should it? In reality, an architecture is the outcome of a team’s work and a response to stakeholder requirements. It therefore makes much more sense to review architecture as the product of a sociotechnical system.
This perspective shifts the emphasis from technical artefacts to the people behind them, their goals, and their interactions. Experience has shown that this approach provides a more efficient and effective way to understand architectures than many traditional review methods.
Attendees will see how sociotechnical reviews work in practice and leave with practical techniques to improve the effectiveness of their own reviews.
Humans and AI in the Feedback Loop of Software Development en
The main challenge of software development is the immense complexity of the systems we build. This complexity can only be managed through continuous feedback.
Every change generates feedback: through unit tests, continuous delivery, monitoring, or from users. These feedback loops help teams evolve and improve their systems incrementally.
Software development thus becomes an interplay between feedback systems and human decision-making. Humans interpret the feedback and determine the next steps, making them a crucial part of the control loop in modern, automated software development.
This talk explores how these insights can be used to optimize software development and what role AI can play in that process.
Der richtige fachliche Schnitt: Wege zu besseren Architekturen en
Der richtige fachliche Schnitt ist der Unterschied zwischen einem unwartbaren Klumpen Code und einem einfach änderbaren System, das die Geschäftsfunktionalitäten perfekt unterstützt. Obwohl er so entscheidend ist, gibt es keinen klaren Weg, diesen Schnitt zu erreichen. Dieser Vortrag diskutiert verschiedene Ansätze und Heuristiken, um einen guten Schnitt zu erreichen: Modelle, Bounded Context oder Event Storming sind nur einige Beispiele. So zeigt der Vortrag, wie man zu besseren Architektur-Entwürfen kommen kann.
Collaborative Software Modelling Beyond Event Storming – Architecture as a Team Capability en
Software architecture is often treated as a discipline for experts only. Yet, the knowledge required to make sound architectural decisions is usually across individuals, teams, domains, and organizational boundaries.
In this interactive full-day workshop, participants will experience first hand how collaborative software modelling helps teams create shared understanding, uncover hidden assumptions, and make better architectural decisions together.
Rather than focusing on theory, participants will actively take part in collaborative modelling sessions, experience an Event Storming session and get some ideas how to apply these techniques to their own projects. Along the way, they will explore the conditions that make collaborative architecture work successful in practice.
During the workshop, participants will:
- Experience collaborative modelling first-hand
- Explore Event Storming and Domain Storytelling through hands-on exercises
- Learn how to create the conditions for successful modelling sessions
- Understand how collaborative practices improve architectural decision-making
- Discover how to create sustainable impact beyond individual workshops
The workshop combines short impulses with extensive hands-on exercises, reflection, and discussion. Participants will leave with practical experience, a deeper understanding of what makes collaborative modelling effective, and concrete ideas they can apply to their own teams and organizations.
Beten wir Komplexität an? en
Komplexität ist die wichtigste Herausforderung in der Softwareentwicklung. Daher ist es wichtig, immer danach zu streben, Komplexität zu eliminieren. Aber manchmal beten wir Komplexität an - und das kann das Problem der Komplexität unlösbar machen.
Können wir Entwickler:innen-Produktivität messen? en
Produktivität zu messen ist nicht so einfach: Metriken wie „Lines of Code“ sind offensichtlich naiv, aber Ansätze wie DORA oder SPACE bieten hilfreiche Einblicke. Aber leider verlieren Metriken ihre Aussagekraft, wenn sie zum Ziel für Teams werden.
Der Vortrag zeigt einen Lösungsweg auf: Statt standardisierter Lösungen sollten Teams individuelle Metriken entwickeln, die ihre spezifischen Herausforderungen adressieren. Die Botschaft: Metriken unterstützen Teams, können jedoch nicht zur Kontrolle missbraucht werden.
KI: Ein Werkzeug für Architektur? en
Sind bald alle Software-Architekt:innen arbeitslos, denn KI-Systeme haben ihren Job übernehmen - so wie alle anderen Jobs auch? In diesem Vortrag gehen wir der Frage nach, ob diese Sorge berechtigt ist. Wir zeigen, wo KI-Tools – insbesondere Large Language Models (LLMs) – heute bereits sinnvoll in der Softwarearchitektur eingesetzt werden können und wo ihre Grenzen liegen. Dabei werfen wir auch einen Blick darauf, wie LLMs eigentlich funktionieren – und was das für ihren praktischen Einsatz bedeutet.
Domain Modularization: Models? Bounded Contexts? en
Bounded Contexts are often considered the go-to solution for modularizing business logic – a key challenge in building maintainable systems. But in practice, the concept of a “Bounded Context” is complex and not always easy to implement.
In this talk, we explore how models can serve as a practical tool for identifying the different parts of a domain. While Domain-Driven Design highlights models—placing them at the heart of Bounded Contexts—they can also be valuable beyond that. Especially when combined with concepts like modules or abstract data types, models offer a powerful approach to structuring domain logic.
Domain Boundaries: Bounded Contexts Are Not Enough en
Getting domain boundaries right is one of the most critical - and most difficult - challenges in software architecture. Done well, it leads to systems that are adaptable, maintainable, and aligned with business capabilities. Done poorly, it results in tightly coupled, unmanageable codebases.
Domain-Driven Design popularized the concept of Bounded Contexts as a key pattern for structuring complex systems. But are they really the solution - or just one tool among many?
This talk explores a range of approaches for discovering and refining domain boundaries, including domain modeling, Bounded Contexts, Event Storming, API design, and Test-Driven Development. Rather than promoting a single method, it presents practical heuristics and trade-offs drawn from real-world experience.
You’ll learn how to combine these techniques to design architectures that better reflect business realities—resulting in systems that are easier to evolve and more effective in delivering value.
Can We Measure Developer Productivity? en
Often, the goal of architecture is to improve developer productivity. But what does it mean for developer to be more productive? And can we measure it? Should we? But if we don't, how can we make any progress?
McKinsey claimed that they could finally measure developer productivity. This was followed by extensive criticism from notable figures such as Daniel Terhorst-North, Kent Beck, and Gergely Orosz. We will look at the different viewpoints and explore whether productivity can be measured and whether it should be.
Architektur Reviews – Architektur verstehen heißt Teams verstehen en
Auf den ersten Blick scheint Software-Architektur ein rein technisches Artefakt zu sein. Entsprechend konzentrieren sich viele Reviews ausschließlich auf Code, Strukturen und Dokumentation – doch greift das zu kurz. In der Praxis ist jede Architektur das Ergebnis eines Teams: Sie spiegelt dessen Entscheidungen, Kommunikationswege und Rahmenbedingungen wider. Ein wirksames Architektur-Review muss daher mehr betrachten als nur technische Artefakte – es muss auch das Zusammenspiel der beteiligten Menschen verstehen. Dieser Vortrag zeigt, wie sich durch einen umfassenden Blick auf Architektur neue Einsichten gewinnen lassen. Wir teilen Erfahrungen aus realen Reviews und zeigen, wie dieser Ansatz zu fundierteren Bewertungen und wirksameren Verbesserungen führt. Teilnehmende erhalten praktische Anregungen, um ihre eigenen Reviews effektiver zu gestalten.
AI: A Tool for Software Architecture? en
Will all software architects soon be out of a job because AI systems have taken over? In this talk, we explore whether this concern is justified. We discuss where AI tools – especially Large Language Models (LLMs) – can already be effectively used in software architecture today, and where their limitations lie. Along the way, we’ll also take a look at how LLMs actually work – and what that means for their practical application.
Legacy Software: Really a Problem? en
Legacy software makes even experienced developers shudder. But the word "legacy" actually has a negative connotation only in IT. And legacy software practically always solves a business problem successfully, while a newly developed software must first find its niche. This presentation shows how to use these and other insights to come up with strategies for dealing more productively and successfully with legacy software. And that's how to turn the "problem" of legacy into an opportunity.
Technical Debt: Maintaining Software Long Term en
Software often becomes less maintainable the longer development teams work on it. The metaphor "technical debt" has been established for this. But technical debt can happen "just like that" and it doesn't always make sense to eliminate it. That's what this talk is about - and about the foundations of the metaphor, how it helps when communicating with managers, why the metaphor is actually not very well chosen, and of course how to deal with technical debt in a sensible way.
Software Architecture for Humans! en
Software architecture is only appearing to be a technical topic. Of course, software needs to have technologies and structures, but people have to be at the focus of the architecture. After all, the key challenge of software development and software architecture is that the software systems the we build are too complex for a single human to understand. However, the organization and management of people can also solve problems that relate to software architecture. Thus, the talk shows the dependencies between architecture, people, and organization - and how to use them to develop software more successfully.
Scaling Software Architecture and Projects en
Software architecture was invented in the sixties to enable larger teams to work on complex software. In this workshop, we will examine how architecture can achieve this concretely today - and how modern architectural approaches such as microservices or the separation of architecture into micro- and macro-architecture help to achieve this. This enables engineering teams to scale and also enables the architecture work by larger groups of people. In addition, we will discuss how this approach can help to scale agile projects.
No Future-Proof Architecture! en
Software architecture should be stable! Choosing the right architecture ensures that software can be successfully maintained in the future! What seems to make sense at the beginning often turns out to be the first step towards an architecture failure. When requirements, know-how or technologies change, the architecture needs to change as well. How can it then be future-proof? The presentation shows how the paradox can be resolved and no future-proof architecture is created - but long-term project success.
Legacy Software: Nur scheinbar ein Problem! de
Legacy Software - dabei erschaudern auch erfahrene Techniker:innen. Aber Legacy heißt eigentlich so viel wie "Erbe" und ist nur in der IT rein negativ besetzt. Und Legacy Software löst praktisch immer ein Business-Problem erfolgreich, während eine Neuentwicklung ihre Nische erst finden muss. Der Vortrag zeigt, wie man diese und andere Erkenntnisse nutzen kann, um Strategien zu entwickeln, mit denen man produktiver und erfolgreicher mit Legacy-Software umgehen kann. Und so wird aus dem Problem "Legacy" eine Chance.
Domain-driven Design: Konzepte und Fallstricke de
Domain-driven Design (DDD) steht für eine Vielzahl an Techniken wie strategisches DDD, taktisches DDD und kollaborative Modellierung. Dieser Vortrag gibt einen Überblick über das DDD-Universum. Dabei stellt er nicht nur die verschiedenen Konzept vor. Er zeigt außerdem auch die jeweiligen Vor- und Nachteile der Praktiken auf und weist auf die typischen Fallstricke hin - und wie man sie vermeiden kann.
Beyond Bounded Context: Getting Boundaries Right in Domain-driven Design en
Getting domain boundaries right makes the difference between an unmaintainable blob of code and a system that is easy to change and truly supports business capabilities. Despite their importance, there is no single, clear path to defining good boundaries. This talk discusses different approaches and heuristics for identifying them, including models, bounded contexts, and event storming. It shows how these techniques can lead to better architectural designs.
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