Pramod Sadalage
Contents
Books in this wiki: Software Architecture The Hard Parts
Background
Pramod Sadalage is a Principal at ThoughtWorks, specialising in data architecture, database design, and the intersection of data and software architecture. He is known for his work on evolutionary database design, agile data techniques, and NoSQL adoption patterns. He was invited to join the SATH author team specifically to bring the data dimension into the architecture trade-off analysis.
Core Positions
- Data as a first-class architectural concern: in distributed architectures, data decisions (who owns what, how data crosses service boundaries, operational vs analytical separation) are as consequential as structural decisions.
- Evolutionary database design: databases should be designed to change incrementally alongside the application, not treated as fixed schema constraints. Co-developed the expand/contract pattern for zero-downtime schema migration.
- NoSQL is not a replacement for relational: different data models suit different access patterns; the right model is determined by how data is read and written, not by a technology preference.
Books
Software Architecture The Hard Parts — Software Architecture: The Hard Parts (2022, with Neal Ford, Mark Richards, Zhamak Dehghani)
Sadalage's contribution is most visible in the operational data separation chapters (Ch 6: Pulling Apart Operational Data) and the data ownership/distributed transactions chapters (Ch 9–10), where data architecture decisions drive architecture decisions and vice versa.