Pros & Cons Layout

April 17, 2026 · View on GitHub

Layout: Two weighted evaluation panels with a bottom synthesis block for the actual decision logic Best for: Trade-off analysis, risk assessment, decision framing, option selection, product evaluation

Template

Decision Memo · Trade-Off

Should We Move to a Plugin-First Architecture?

The goal is not to score both sides evenly. The goal is to make the dependency, maintenance, and ecosystem trade-offs visible enough to support a decision.

Upside

Why It Helps

  • Feature velocity improves when extensions ship independently.
  • Core code stays smaller and easier to reason about.
  • Community contributions get a cleaner boundary.

Risk

What It Costs

  • Public APIs harden earlier and become expensive to change.
  • Version skew can create support and compatibility overhead.
  • Quality variance increases without stronger contract testing.

Decision Logic

Choose plugin-first only if the extension surface is stable enough to document and test. If the product is still changing at the primitive level, keep integration points internal for one more cycle.