Islandr — Architecture

Self-hosted WireGuard access management. Islandr manages the full peer lifecycle, group-based RBAC access control, and nftables enforcement on a single hub — one native binary, no SaaS, no control plane you don't own.

This site is the interactive C4 model of the system, generated from architecture/workspace.dsl in the islandr repository. It is the source of truth for how the pieces fit together; the PNG exports in the repo's docs/ are rendered from the same model.

▶ Start here: the Islandr container view

The diagrams live under the Islandr software system — that is the entry point. Open Islandr → Container view to see the runnable parts, then drill down: click a container to zoom into its components, or switch to the deployment views.

One system, plus its context

This model documents exactly one software system: Islandr. Everything else in the Software Systems list is an external dependency Islandr talks to — those pages carry a short description and a context diagram, but no internal views, because they are not ours to design.

System Role Has internal views?
Islandr The platform itself — hub backend, both SPAs, database Yes — start here
OIDC Provider Authenticates users (Microsoft 365 / Google Workspace) No (external)
WireGuard Linux kernel VPN module, managed via wg No (external)
nftables Linux kernel packet filter, enforces the ACL ruleset No (external)
Cloudflare / Reverse Proxy Edge and TLS termination No (external)
Resource Host A machine behind the VPN (e.g. an RDP server) No (external)

So if a system in the sidebar shows only text, it is external context. The one you can walk through is Islandr.

How to read this model (C4)

The Islandr system follows the C4 notation — four zoom levels, each a tab on the Islandr page:

Level View What it answers
1 Context Who uses Islandr and which external systems it touches
2 Container The runnable parts: the two SPAs, the Quarkus backend, the database
3 Component Inside the backend: auth, acl, peer, firewall, wg, audit, …
Deployment How containers map onto real infrastructure — native (systemd) and Docker (evaluation)

Related documentation

  • PRD — the product requirements: problem, goals, personas (Felix, Lena, Tom), scope, domain model, and key flows.
  • Roadmap — what's shipped, in progress, and planned.
  • Decisions — the architecture decision records (ADRs) behind the design, browsable per decision.
  • README — install, run, and operate Islandr.