MercuryArc

MercuryArc is a hypothetical software architecture designed to demonstrate how modular, event-driven systems can be composed for modern cloud environments. It envisions applications built from small, reusable units that communicate through a common substrate, enabling scalable and loosely coupled configurations.

In MercuryArc, applications are constructed from units called arcs. Each arc implements a specific capability (such as data ingestion, transformation, storage, or presentation) and exposes well-defined interfaces to other arcs. Communication across arcs relies on a unified Mercury Bus, which standardizes data contracts and routing rules. The design emphasizes explicit data schemas, versioning, and end-to-end observability for easier maintenance and evolution.

Key components include the Mercury Bus, a module registry and loader, and a schema/data-contract system. The bus supports publish-subscribe, request-reply, and streaming semantics, with backpressure, retries, and delivery guarantees where appropriate. The registry tracks arc versions and dependencies, while the loader handles dynamic deployment and hot-swapping of arcs. Telemetry, tracing, and structured logging are integrated to support debugging and performance tuning.

Development and deployment in MercuryArc favor polyglot approaches, allowing arcs to be authored in multiple programming languages and connected via adapters and common contracts. Deployments typically run on container orchestration platforms and are configured with declarative manifests that specify arc topology, routing rules, and security policies. Access control is implemented per-arc, with governance policies enforced through defined contracts and data schemas.

MercuryArc remains a conceptual model rather than a widely adopted technology. It is used in academic and speculative discussions to explore modularity, scalability, and interoperability in distributed systems. See also: event-driven architecture, microservices, data contracts, reactive programming.