Workflow Patterns

Structural patterns for building workflows that scale.

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Available Patterns

Pattern	Problem	Solution
Three-Stage Design	Complex workflows become tangled	Separate discovery, execution, and reporting
Matrix Distribution	Sequential processing is slow	Parallelize with dynamic matrices

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When to Use

These patterns address workflow-level concerns:

• Scaling - Processing many targets efficiently
• Observability - Understanding what happened and why
• Maintainability - Keeping workflows readable as complexity grows
• Resilience - Handling partial failures gracefully

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Relationship to Other Patterns

Workflow patterns compose with implementation patterns:

graph TB
    subgraph WP["Workflow Patterns"]
        A[Three-Stage Design]
        B[Matrix Distribution]
    end

    subgraph IP["Implementation Patterns"]
        C[Idempotency]
        D[Work Avoidance]
    end

    A --> C
    B --> C
    B --> D

    %% Ghostty Hardcore Theme
    style A fill:#65d9ef,color:#1b1d1e
    style B fill:#65d9ef,color:#1b1d1e
    style C fill:#a7e22e,color:#1b1d1e
    style D fill:#a7e22e,color:#1b1d1e

A three-stage workflow uses idempotency to make reruns safe. Matrix distribution uses work avoidance to skip unnecessary operations.

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Design workflows that survive contact with production.