Legend

Building Relationships

Relationships are what make Legend a map rather than a list. This page covers how to connect entities, which relationships matter most, and how to keep the connections trustworthy.

Why relationships matter

A collection of Agents and Landmarks with no relationships is just two lists. The connections are what let you answer real questions: who owns this, what depends on it, and where is the documentation. Every relationship you add makes the next question easier to answer.

Connecting an owner to a Landmark

  1. Open the Landmark you want to assign.
  2. Set its owner to the responsible person or team.
  3. Save. The ownership now appears on both the Landmark and the owning Agent.

Connecting Landmarks to each other

Dependencies are the relationships between Landmarks. They record that one thing relies on another.

  1. Open the Landmark that depends on another, for example the invoicing process.
  2. Add a relationship to the Landmark it depends on, for example the Billing API.
  3. Save, then open the Billing API and confirm the invoicing process now shows as something that depends on it.

Screenshot: the relationship panel on a service, listing its owner, its dependents, and its attached documentation.

Attaching documentation

  1. Create or open the document Landmark.
  2. Link it to the Landmark it describes.
  3. Save. Anyone who lands on that entity now finds the relevant reading right there.

Good habits for relationships

  • Add relationships as you create entities, while the context is fresh, rather than in a big batch later.
  • Prefer connecting to teams for ownership so the map survives people changing roles.
  • When you retire a service or process, update or remove its relationships so the map does not point at things that no longer exist.