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2948 questions of the kind that actually get asked — in interviews, in architecture review boards, and by the person who has to run the thing at 3 AM. Every answer states the trade-off rather than the slogan, and says when the obvious choice is the wrong one.

All areas2948 Architecture Fundamentals91 Distributed Systems101 Data Architecture90 Cloud Architecture87 Networking96 API & Integration Architecture87 Reliability & Resilience99 Observability92 Performance & Capacity Engineering100 Security Architecture105 Cost Architecture & FinOps102 Business Architecture103 Architecture Communication102 Enterprise Architecture100 Legacy Modernization102 AI-Era Architecture106 Software Architecture & Engineering93 Architecture Patterns94 Architecture Decision-Making101 The Architect's Meta-Skills102 Delivery & Release Engineering103 Platform Engineering & Developer Experience102 Testing & Quality Architecture102 Data Platform Architecture98 Streaming & Real-Time Data103 Data Governance & Semantics91 Frontend & Experience Architecture101 Edge, Mobile & IoT98 Regulatory & Data Protection Architecture99 Assurance, Audit & Model Risk98
Difficulty Any beginner intermediate advanced

5 questions in Reference Data.

  1. Reference Data intermediate

    A reference data set of branch codes is maintained by an operations team. A branch closes in March and its code is retired. In September the code is assigned to a new branch in another city. Six months later finance asks why one branch's historical performance looks impossible. What happens across the estate?

    2 min answer reference-dataidentifiershistoryjoins
  2. Reference Data advanced

    A travel platform's currency, tax and geography reference data changes over time. Bookings must be reproducible years later. What does the reference data architecture need?

    1 min answer reference-dataversioningtemporalreproducibility
  3. Reference Data beginner

    An order total is stored as the integer 1000 alongside a currency code. In USD that is ten dollars. The same integer means one thousand yen in JPY and one dinar in KWD. A report sums the column across currencies and the total looks plausible. Why is this a reference-data problem rather than a bug in the report?

    3 min answer reference datacurrencyminor unitsiso 4217
  4. Reference Data intermediate

    Tax rates change annually and must apply from a specific date. How do you manage that across a dozen systems?

    2 min answer reference-dataversioningeffective-datesdistribution
  5. Reference Data advanced

    Twilio's public Messages API documents a fixed set of message status values, and the initial value depends on how the message was created - accepted when a Messaging Service is used, queued when it is not. Every customer who writes an exhaustive match over that list inherits a dependency on it. What does publishing a code list as part of an API force on its owner, and where would copying that approach be a mistake?

    3 min answer twilioreference-datacode-listsapi-contracts