In this post you'll find: micro-monolith neo-evangelism :), great (video) example of premature system distribution hitting the fan ..., demystifying of microservice independence myth and what are X-centric systems. I hate blog posts, books or conf talks that focus on criticising only - it's far easier to b*tch on something than propose an actual solution to non-trivial problems. That's why after my recent post (on why microservices may not be an optimal answer to all of your growth problems), I'd like to re-visit an architectural pattern almost as old as Computer Science in general, in fact, a very under-appreciated one ... Sharding.…
By reading this article you'll learn that: not everything that appears as pep talk is a brainwash, you can be a Moses (& carve some stone tablets) for your team, why 10 commandments are better than "Chairman's Mao Little Red Book", where's the border between good & bad principles, where do the values come from (& whether they can be imposed) ... Utterly pragmatic creatures known as engineers are by definition allergic to any kind of activities they classify as "brainwash". This category is quite wide: all sorts of pep talks, motivational speeches, noble ideas/values behind…
By reading this article you'll learn that ... orchestra (like Emperor) is naked, easy problems sometimes get far more sexy solutions than the hard ones (so screw those), SOA is not dead, microservices in the wild tend to be grotesque & out-scaling can be achieved in several different ways. First of all, thanks for reading this :) I'm quite sure that at least 3/4 of potential readers have dropped off after seeing the word "microservice". And ... I don't blame them at all, I'm fed up as well. That's one of the reasons why I've written this article. Hello (microservice)…
By reading this blog post you're learn that: transparency is deeply in shoes business, Definition of Done should contain necessary outbound communication, asynchrony is (again) king, publish-subscribe pattern has successful application scenarios out of code as well & habitual transparency can be a side effect of any kind of work. If I were to create statistics of words most frequently used in my posts, "transparency" would certainly rank high. For a reason. I strongly believe that the transparency is a foundation of every healthy work environment. But what does it really mean? Answering frankly to questions that do…
By reading this blog post you'll learn: that creative chaos works only until some point, personal emotions play an important part in making changes happen, "calm" doesn't have to mean "slow" and even fighter pilots can't go wild frantically if they want to survive. There's an old adage everyone knows & ocassionally quotes: Tylko spokój może nas uratować (PL) Only piece (of mind) can save us (EN) I've tried to trace its origin, but I've failed. It has just been used too widely, by too many historical figures on too many ocassions. Fortunately, what really matters…
By reading this blog post you'll learn: an importance of naming elusive things, that surplus of empathy can cause a lot of harm, why sometimes being unpopular is not that bad, that even Dale Carnegie was sometimes wrong (or at least not 100% right) Internet & libraries are full of advices, techniques & "golden rules" for leaders & managers. Some are very general, some are laser-sharp specific. Some are all too obvious, some may be even contradictory :) I don't have my specific ruleset. In general I try to be flexible & fit the environment I work within, but…
TL;DR In majority of scenarios real technical mastery has a tertiary degree of importance - being just solid, playing it safe & avoiding accidental complexity is just enough until market gets very dense, interest reaches viral levels or competitive factor is about pure tech (very rare). Very few companies (excluding some unicorns) compete with just tech as their primary weapon - it's usually all about the product, idea behind it & how fast it has been delivered (before the competitors ...). Disclaimer: keep your seatbelt buckled up, we're going to get a bit controversial here & you may not like…
TL;DR Many people in the industry are so used to free high-quality content available on-line, that they can't accept the simple fact you actually have to pay for some stuff. Software crafts(wo)men who should be the first to preach for digital rights respect are the first one to breach them (& boast happily about that) - e.g. by stealing content from on-line services that (for a reasonable price) help them boost their careers. Disclaimer: no, I haven't changed my mind & I'll keep blogging in English; however this particular post is related to situation I find…