# Understanding the Quality Profiles for Archify Diagrams: A Complete Guide

> Explore Archify diagram quality profiles standard and showcase. Understand how each profile validates composition, ensuring your diagrams meet project needs.

- Repository: [tt-a1i/archify](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify)
- Tags: deep-dive
- Published: 2026-09-04

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**Archify provides two distinct quality profiles—**`standard`** and **`showcase`**—that control how strictly diagram composition is validated, with **standard** permitting warnings for drafts and **showcase** enforcing hard errors for production artifacts.**

The `tt-a1i/archify` repository implements these profiles to support different stages of diagram creation, from early exploratory sketches to polished, publication-ready visualizations. Understanding when to apply each **quality profile for Archify diagrams** ensures your documentation pipeline handles drafts permissively while maintaining strict quality gates for final deliverables.

## What Are Quality Profiles in Archify?

Quality profiles in Archify are named configuration sets that determine validation behavior and visual rendering constraints. Stored in the `meta.quality_profile` field of your workflow files, these profiles dictate whether composition issues generate warnings or fatal errors.

According to [`generated/maka-regenerated.workflow.json`](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify/blob/main/generated/maka-regenerated.workflow.json), the schema accepts exactly two string values: `"standard"` and `"showcase"`【7†source】. This binary approach simplifies decision-making while providing clear separation between development and production states.

## The Standard Quality Profile

The **`standard`** profile serves as the default fallback when no `meta.quality_profile` is explicitly set. As documented in `archify/test/workflow-migration.test.mjs`, this profile defaults to `standard` to accommodate iterative development workflows【388†source】.

**Key characteristics:**

- **Validation behavior:** Composition issues surface as **warnings** rather than errors
- **CLI exit status:** Process exits with success (0) despite visual imperfections
- **Use cases:** Exploratory work, early-stage drafts, and internal documentation where strict visual constraints are unnecessary

The [`examples/maka-architecture.html`](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify/blob/main/examples/maka-architecture.html) file demonstrates this profile in practice, using the attribute `data-quality-profile="standard"` on the SVG element【5008†source】.

## The Showcase Quality Profile

The **`showcase`** profile targets polished, production-ready artifacts intended for public presentation or repository commits. The [`docs/authoring-cookbook.md`](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify/blob/main/docs/authoring-cookbook.md) explicitly recommends this profile "for a polished artifact" after using `standard` during exploration【58†source】.

**Key characteristics:**

- **Validation behavior:** Any composition violation triggers a **hard error**
- **Visual constraints:** Enforces tight budgets including zero line crossings, limited bends, and minimum node spacing
- **CLI exit status:** Non-zero exit code when validation fails, suitable for CI/CD quality gates
- **Use cases:** Final deliverables, proof-of-concepts checked into version control, and public presentations

You can observe this implementation in [`examples/web-app.html`](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify/blob/main/examples/web-app.html), which declares `data-quality-profile="showcase"` on its SVG output【5007†source】.

## How to Configure Quality Profiles

Archify provides three methods for setting quality profiles: embedded metadata, CLI overrides, and programmatic configuration.

### Workflow Metadata

Define the profile directly in your workflow JSON file:

```json
{
  "meta": {
    "title": "Customer checkout flow",
    "quality_profile": "showcase"
  }
}

```

### CLI Override

Override any embedded profile using the `--quality` flag, as tested in `archify/test/workflow-migration.test.mjs`:

```bash
archify render my-diagram.workflow.json --quality showcase --output diagram.svg

```

This command-line option allows CI pipelines to enforce `showcase` standards regardless of what individual authors specified in their metadata.

## Working with Quality Profiles Programmatically

When generating diagrams via the JavaScript API, pass the `qualityProfile` option to `compileWorkflow`:

```javascript
// Setting the profile programmatically when generating a diagram
const diagram = compileWorkflow({
  workflow: myWorkflow,
  qualityProfile: 'showcase'   // or 'standard'
});

```

This approach integrates with build tools that dynamically adjust quality requirements based on deployment targets.

## Summary

- Archify supports exactly two **quality profiles for Archify diagrams**: `standard` and `showcase`.
- **`standard`** is the default behavior, treating composition issues as warnings suitable for drafts.
- **`showcase`** enforces strict validation with fatal errors, ensuring production-ready output.
- Configure profiles via `meta.quality_profile` in JSON files, `--quality` CLI flags, or the `qualityProfile` API option.
- Source references including `archify/test/workflow-migration.test.mjs` and [`docs/authoring-cookbook.md`](https://github.com/tt-a1i/archify/blob/main/docs/authoring-cookbook.md) confirm these behaviors are intentional design decisions for different workflow stages.

## Frequently Asked Questions

### What is the default quality profile in Archify?

**Standard** is the default quality profile when the `meta.quality_profile` field is omitted from your workflow file. According to `archify/test/workflow-migration.test.mjs`, the system automatically falls back to `standard` to support permissive, iterative development workflows without breaking builds【388†source】.

### How do I override the quality profile from the command line?

Use the `--quality` flag followed by either `standard` or `showcase`. This CLI override takes precedence over any embedded metadata settings, allowing DevOps pipelines to enforce strict validation regardless of individual file configurations.

### What happens when a showcase profile diagram has composition errors?

The rendering fails with a non-zero exit status. Unlike the `standard` profile which logs warnings and continues, `showcase` treats all composition violations—such as line crossings or insufficient node spacing—as fatal errors that halt the build process.

### Can I set the quality profile programmatically?

Yes. When calling `compileWorkflow()` in JavaScript, pass the `qualityProfile` property in your options object with either `'standard'` or `'showcase'` as the value. This integrates quality controls directly into automated generation scripts and build pipelines.