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development

You Aren't Google

March 28, 2010 20:54:03.683

I like this post, because it makes a point that a lot of web developers really need to understand: you aren't going to have massive scaling issues:

The sooner your company admits this, the sooner you can get down to some real work. Developing the app for Google-sized scale is a waste of your time, plus, there is no way you will get it right. Absolutely none. It's not that you're not smart enough, it's that you do not have the experience to know what problems you will see at scale.

He's making that point in the context of NoSQL databases (vsersus SQL), but it holds for a lot more. I'm reminded of an anecdote a friend related to me years ago when he just started a new job. He was being shown a web project with a 3 tier architecture, failover capabilities, expensive software all around. When he asked how many users of the system there were going to be, the answer was "3 or so now, maybe 10-20 later". When he suggested that they just use something like Access, they treated him like some kind of heretic, and hustled him along to a different project.

That's the kind of thinking that powers a lot of fake work in this industry...

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posted by James Robertson

Comments

Re: You Aren't Google

[anonymous] March 28, 2010 22:02:21.433

What? You want your iPhone to download and do a Sqlite insert of 45,000 records in just a few minutes? Repeat after me, IT"S A PHONE, not a 3Ghz desktop machine...

Or use the database for more than a set of tuples

[eric] March 29, 2010 11:42:38.114

What gets me is the failure to use the database.  If an organization spends tons of money on Oracle, then why spend many developer hours and dollars on a complex fat middle tier.  With Ajax on the front end and stored procedures in the database, a middle tier should service as simple redirecting/integration point only.  Maintaining transactions, failover and performance is much easier.  These databases have their own caching without building a first and second level caches in the middle tier.  Or, if an architect is so bent on having that perfect OO architecture and wants the DB to just serve as an object store, then use a freeware DB. Oracle, DB2 and SQL Server buy very little in this case.

Or use the database for more than a set of tuples

[anonymous] March 29, 2010 11:42:48.764

What gets me is the failure to use the database. If an organization spends tons of money on Oracle, then why spend many developer hours and dollars on a complex fat middle tier. With Ajax on the front end and stored procedures in the database, a middle tier should service as simple redirecting/integration point only. Maintaining transactions is much easier. These databases have their own caching without building a first and second level caches in the middle tier. Or, if an architect is so bent on having that perfect OO architecture and wants the DB to just serve as an object store, then use a freeware DB. Oracle, DB2 and SQL Server buy very little in this case.

A Quote

[George] March 29, 2010 17:17:31.370

There's a quote that I can't find on the web anymore, by a developer named Kevin B. Smith:

"I wish the architect and management had spent more effort building a product that a million people wanted to use, and less effort building a product that could be used by a million people."

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