FlowMart System Architecture: High-Level Overview

This diagram provides a high-level overview of the FlowMart e-commerce platform architecture. It illustrates the main components and how they interact to deliver our online shopping experience.

Business Context

FlowMart is an e-commerce platform that enables customers to browse products, place orders, make payments, and track shipments. The architecture is designed to be scalable, resilient, and maintainable, following domain-driven design and event-driven architecture principles.

High-Level Architecture Diagram

Component Descriptions

Customer Channels

• Web Application: A responsive web interface for customers to browse products and place orders
• Mobile Apps: Native iOS and Android applications for mobile shopping
• Third-Party Integrations: External platforms that integrate with our services

API Gateway Layer

• API Gateway / BFF: Backend for Frontend that routes requests, handles authentication, and optimizes responses for different clients

Core Business Domains

• Orders Domain: Manages the order lifecycle from creation to fulfillment
• Inventory Domain: Tracks product availability and stock levels
• Payment Domain: Processes payments and manages financial transactions
• Shipping Domain: Handles order delivery and shipment tracking
• Subscription Domain: Manages recurring subscriptions and memberships
• Notification Domain: Delivers notifications to customers across different channels

Data Stores

• Each domain has its dedicated database to ensure domain isolation and independent scalability

External Systems

• Payment Gateways: Third-party services for processing credit card payments
• Logistics Providers: External shipping and delivery services
• Email/SMS Providers: Services for sending notifications to customers

Key Architectural Principles

1. Domain-Driven Design: Our system is organized around business domains and their bounded contexts
2. Event-Driven Architecture: Services communicate primarily through events, enhancing decoupling and scalability
3. Microservices: Each domain is implemented as one or more microservices with clear boundaries
4. API-First Approach: All functionality is exposed through well-defined APIs
5. Polyglot Persistence: Each domain can choose the most appropriate database technology

Next Steps

For a more detailed view of our architecture, refer to the following documents:

• Domain-Level Architecture
• Service-Level Architecture
• Data Flow Architecture