Structurizr CLI

Structurizr is a "diagrams as code" toolset for software-architecture modelling, created by Simon Brown, who also authored the underlying C4 model. Rather than drawing boxes by hand, a user describes a single architecture model in text and generates multiple consistent, version-controllable diagrams from it. The family includes a cloud/on-premises server (commercial), a lightweight local web application called Structurizr Lite for previewing and editing a single workspace, and the Structurizr CLI, a command-line tool for scripting and CI pipelines. As of the current documentation, Structurizr Lite and the standalone CLI are marked end-of-life in favour of the server product, though the export libraries remain open source.

The core artefact is a workspace, whose model is fundamentally a graph: nodes are elements (person, softwareSystem, container, component, plus deploymentNode instances for infrastructure) and edges are directed relationships between them. On top of this single graph the author defines views — system context, container, component, dynamic, and deployment diagrams — that each select and lay out a subset of elements, following the four hierarchical levels of the C4 model. Tags, styles, and themes control notation. The model is authored either in the text-based Structurizr DSL (format:structurizr-dsl) or as the equivalent Structurizr JSON workspace format, which the DSL compiles to.

In the graph-data and format-conversion world, Structurizr's role is that of a source model with many one-way exporters. The CLI's export command emits PlantUML (both the native and C4-PlantUML dialects) and format:plantuml, format:mermaid, WebSequenceDiagrams, DOT/Graphviz (format:dot), format:d2, and Ilograph YAML, as well as static HTML and JSON. This lets the same DSL feed downstream renderers such as tool:graphviz, Kroki (tool:kroki), or PlantUML-based pipelines, keeping diagrams in sync from one text source. Other CLI subcommands handle push/pull, validate, inspect, merge, and workspace lifecycle operations against a server.

Strengths are its tight, opinionated grounding in C4, a compact and readable DSL, strong Git-friendliness, and broad export coverage that interoperates with common text-diagram formats. Limitations are equally clear: exports are one-directional, so there is no round-tripping back from PlantUML, Mermaid, or DOT into the model; PNG/SVG rendering depends on a browser and is not available from the CLI; the model is specialised for software architecture rather than general-purpose graph data; and the deprecation of Lite and the CLI creates uncertainty for existing tooling built on them.