TxDiagramme

TxDiagramme is a diagram notation and light tooling for visualizing transactional workflows in distributed systems. It aims to capture the flow of transactions, compensating actions, and state changes across components such as services, databases, queues, and external APIs in a concise, machine-readable form.

Notation and semantics: The notation uses boxes for components, directed edges for transactional messages, and markers to indicate commit or rollback. Elements carry metadata such as transaction identifiers, isolation levels, and timing constraints. The diagrams emphasize transactional boundaries, failure handling, and the wiring of compensating actions.

Syntax sketch: A -> B: ReserveFunds [tx=TX123, outcome=committed, isolation=Serializable]; B -> Storage: Persist [tx=TX123]; B -x Storage: Compensate [tx=TX123]. Sagas, two-phase commit, and compensations can be represented with explicit edges and nodes. Optional steps and retries may be annotated on edges.

History and status: The concept emerged in early 2020s community discussions as a concise alternative to verbose sequence diagrams for transactional behavior. Open-source parsers and renderers have been developed, with ongoing proposals to harmonize with BPMN or UML activity diagrams.

See also: Transactional diagrams; Sagas; Two-phase commit; Event-driven architecture; Modeling language.