Architecture View for System

System boundary and deployment. See STV_ADR_001: Static build integration and browser runtime.

Open linked architecture diagram

Boundary and deployment

The product consists of Sphinx build integration (STV_SE_BUILD) and Browser exploration runtime (STV_SE_BROWSER). The author runs Sphinx on the host project. Readers open the generated files locally or through a static server. No application server, database or remote API belongs to this architecture. Runtime state lives in each page instance; persistence across reloads is not required by the baseline.

The host remains authoritative for Needs and broken-link validation. The extension rejects invalid invocations and model mappings but renders available trace data even when host validation reports dangling targets. The generated bundle is a build-time snapshot; rebuilding incorporates source changes.

System interfaces

  • Author input: RST invocation and host configuration; see Internal interfaces and model contract.

  • Host input: completed Needs collection, relation definitions and rendered Need fragments. Adaptation is isolated behind the build integration.

  • Build output: HTML, graph/data scripts, full-detail fragments and local runtime assets. Browser exploration needs no network fetch.

  • Reader output: bounded interactive view, full-object overlays and original documentation links, with Firefox/Windows as the initial verification target.

Error ownership

Missing/unknown seed or invalid required model mapping: extension build error. Missing trace target: retain identity in the graph; host validation owns failure. Over-cap interaction: refuse the transition and announce why, without changing view state. Offline external links remain external and cannot be guaranteed available; see the design review gaps in Review and scope decisions.

Diagram source: architecture/diagrams/system-architecture.drawio. Edit in Draw.io and export SVG; element boxes link to their Need records.

Selected external dependencies

The host uses Python, Sphinx and Sphinx-Needs at the accepted baseline versions. The build integration adds Beautiful Soup for HTML extraction. Its distributed runtime contains ELK.js, D3 zoom/selection and Floating UI; all are locally bundled. Node/npm, esbuild, Hatchling, pytest, Selenium and geckodriver are maintainer or verification tools, not required reader services. Versions, licenses and boundary allocations are in Technology stack and dependency decisions. The complete handover is Implementation concept and handover.

Visible-area SVG output boundary

STV_SYS_011 adds a reader-generated standalone SVG output to the existing static bundle/browser boundary. The build prepares safe local resource bytes; the browser captures presentation and requests an OS/browser download. No external service or new system element is introduced. File location and cancellation belong to browser settings and the OS dialog, not STV filesystem privileges.