xxlllq/system_architect: a Chinese exam-prep repository for the Senior Systems Architect certification

What xxlllq/system_architect is, and who it is actually for

This is not a library you import. It is a Git repository of study files for 系统架构设计师, the Senior Systems Architect level of China's 软考 (Soft Examination) certification, and the README describes it as 备考资料, preparation material. The audience is narrow and specific: candidates registered for that exam who read Chinese and want past papers, the official textbook, recorded lectures and essay templates in one place rather than assembled from scattered sources.

The README states that the project has been updated free of charge since 2018 and that it has helped a large number of candidates pass at the lowest cost and in the shortest time. That claim is the author's, not a measured outcome, and nothing in the repository lets a reader verify it. What can be verified from the layout is the shape of the archive: nine numbered top-level folders covering video, textbooks, 2009 to 2025 past papers, essay models, lecture notes, other material, study notes, quiz software and a computer-based exam operation guide.

If your goal is to understand how to design a distributed system for work, this repository will not help. It is exam-shaped. The papers, the syllabus and the essay formats are the product.

How the archive is organised: folders, not code

The data flow here is manual. There is no build step, no index and no search. A reader opens the repository, picks a numbered folder, and downloads the files inside. The README's update log is the only navigational aid, and it is organised by date rather than by topic.

That structure has a consequence worth naming. Folder 3 is labelled 历年真题及解析【2009-2025年】, past papers and analyses from 2009 to 2025. Folder 4 holds 论文【真题范文+模板】, essay questions with model answers and templates. Folder 2 holds the textbook, the syllabus and a study guide. Because the log records corrections after the fact, the same paper can appear in more than one state: the README notes that on 2023-08-26 the answer and analysis for question 23 of the 2022 comprehensive-knowledge paper were corrected, and that on 2024-09-14 an option in question 4 of the 2021 comprehensive-knowledge paper was corrected and supplemented. A reader who downloaded the earlier file has the wrong version and no way to be told.

The repository's primary language is listed as HTML, which reflects the fact that the material is largely rendered documents and pages rather than source code. There is no test suite, no package manifest and no release. The README's release history is empty in the sense that no versioned releases exist; updates are commits to master.

Getting the material and opening a first past paper

There is no installer. The README points readers to the repository itself and, for the newest full set, to an external page at fchxxn.com/exam. The README gives no clone command, so the only documented ways in are the repository page, the QQ number 2679450097, the email address [email protected] and the registration portal at bm.ruankao.org.cn.

Once you have the files locally, the numbering is the only map you get. Folder 3 is 3. 历年真题及解析【2009-2025年】 and folder 4 is 4. 论文【真题范文+模板】; the README's examples name files by year and paper, such as the 2025 May comprehensive-knowledge, case-analysis and essay papers, and the 2024 November equivalents. Browsing means descending into the folder for the year you care about.

The README also lists third-party quiz channels, including a web version and a WeChat mini program, and folder 9.2 is a 机考系统操作指南, a guide to operating the computer-based exam system. Those are the entry points the README actually documents; it does not describe a command-line workflow.

The paid split of 2021-08-24, and what stayed free

The most important constraint is stated plainly in the README and is easy to skim past. The project had been updated free since 2018, but after reports that others were reselling the free material for profit, the author decided that starting 2021-08-24 some resources would no longer be updated free of charge, with a link to fchxxn.com/exam for the latest full set. Material previously contributed by QQ group members would remain free.

This is a real boundary for anyone evaluating the repository as a long-term study source. The free tree is not abandoned, but it is no longer the whole product. The 2026-05-20 entry notes an update to 2026 May sprint and mock material, and the 2026-03-31 entry notes an update to the full 2026 May preparation video set; the README does not say which of those land in the repository and which sit behind the paid link. Treat the repository as an archive with a documented free subset, not as a complete current course.

The second constraint is the licence. No licence is listed for the repository. That matters more than usual here, because the contents include a published textbook, official syllabus documents, recorded lecture video and past exam papers whose rights belong to the exam authority or to publishers. A repository with no licence grants no reuse rights by default, and redistributing the textbook PDF or the videos is a different act from reading them. Nothing in the README addresses this, and it is not a question this article can answer for you.

Where this is the wrong tool

If you arrived from a search for what a system architect does, or for a system architect versus a solution architect, this repository is not the answer. It does not explain the role, it does not compare job titles and it contains no salary or career material. The README is entirely about exam preparation: registration windows, paper updates, mock exams and essay models.

A second case: the material is in Chinese. The syllabus, the textbook, the papers and the essay templates are all Chinese-language documents tied to a Chinese certification. A reader who cannot work in Chinese gets nothing from it, and machine translation of an essay template is not a substitute for the writing skill the exam tests.

A third case: the exam format has changed. The README records that from the second half of 2023 the computer software qualification exam moved from paper to computer-based testing, and folder 9.2 is a 机考系统操作指南, a guide to operating the computer-based exam system. Older material prepared for a paper exam may still be useful for content but not for the mechanics of sitting the test. Anyone using pre-2023 mock papers to rehearse timing should check that folder first.

What a real alternative looks like

The honest alternative is not another GitHub repository. It is the official textbook and syllabus, which this repository itself redistributes: 系统架构设计师教程（第2版）, published in December 2022 per the README, and 系统架构设计师考试大纲（第2版）. Buying or borrowing those directly gives you the authoritative text with a clear provenance, and it removes the version-drift problem described earlier, where a corrected answer in the repository may not be the copy you already downloaded.

The difference in approach is one of packaging versus authorship. The official materials are the source; this repository is an aggregation that adds past papers, answer analyses, recorded lectures, essay models and a computer-based exam walkthrough around them. If you want the source, go to the source. If you want the aggregation, and you accept that the newest part of it is now paid and that the free part is a snapshot with occasional corrections, this repository is a reasonable starting point. The README also points to third-party quiz applications and a web version, which are separate products rather than alternatives to the repository itself.

Maintenance and the cost of keeping up

The repository is not archived. The last push was on 2026-05-22, which is recent enough that the update stream is still running. The README's log shows a steady cadence tied to the exam calendar: registration notices, video sets for the May and November sittings, mock papers shortly before each sitting, and the papers themselves a few months after.

The upgrade cost is mostly a reading cost. There is no dependency to bump and no migration to run, but the log shows that corrections arrive as ordinary commits, and the only way to catch them is to re-read UpdateLog.md and re-download the affected files. The 2025-05-28 to 2025-07-28 entry, for example, added the 2025 May comprehensive-knowledge, case-analysis and essay papers with analyses; the 2024-08-17 entry corrected and supplemented the 2024 May papers. If you studied from a paper before its correction date, you studied from a version the author later revised.

One more thing visible in the layout: there is a folder named 资源保护记录, a resource-protection record, which is consistent with the README's complaint about resale. It signals that the author is watching redistribution. Combined with the absent licence, that is a reason to keep your use personal and to avoid republishing files.

Editorial conclusion

Adopt this repository if you are preparing for China's Senior Systems Architect exam and want a free, historically deep archive of past papers, the Tsinghua second-edition textbook and writing templates; the 2009 to 2025 paper folders and the essay section are the parts worth opening first. Do not adopt it if you are looking for architecture guidance for a production system, or if you expect the newest mock exams and sprint material without paying, since the README states that part of the update stream stopped being free on 2021-08-24. Before relying on it, open the UpdateLog.md entry for the term you are sitting and confirm which files in folder 3 actually cover that sitting, because the README's own examples show corrections and additions arriving months after a paper was first published.

Frequently asked questions

Official sources

1. Issues
2. Project website
3. README
4. xxlllq/system_architect on GitHub