#architecture (9)
Copying Is Cheap. Running the Copy Is Expensive
Why "we built our own analog" and "we localized it" isn't innovation but a deferred invoice. A breakdown of what it costs to live on someone else's architecture and why sovereignty can't be bought on a Marketplace.
FAANG the Russian Way: The Cult of Canon and Antipatterns Born of Good Intentions
Why "we want architecture like FAANG" so often turns out to be the beginning of the end. On the cult of canon, antipatterns born of good intentions, and one short word that saves projects more reliably than any pattern.
Event Storming Without the Hype: Pros, Cons, and a Sticky Note on Your Forehead
A personal take on Event Storming after more than one "event storm": where it genuinely saves a team, where it turns into pointless sticker-therapy, and what it takes to keep a session from going down the drain.
Data Exchange Formats: From JSON to Protobuf
A deep dive into data exchange formats: where JSON lives, why XML still matters, what makes YAML great, and when it is time to switch to binary Protobuf, Avro, and MessagePack — tied to APIs and message brokers.
Architecture on Easy Mode
When a monolith pays off and when it is time to move to microservices — I break down the architecture choice through the cost of a single line of code, without the usual droning about "scalability" and "fault tolerance".
UML: what kind of beast is it, and why analysts steer clear
UML can visualize, specify and document a system — yet you almost never see it used on real teams. Let’s figure out what it’s for, why analysts avoid it, and where it actually pays off.
Microservices or Monolith?
A cheat sheet for choosing an architecture: the pros and cons of monoliths and microservices, what works better for a small company, what level of engineers you need, and a checklist to help you pick an approach.
Message Brokers — the Nuances
What a message broker actually is, and how the three classic solutions — RabbitMQ, ActiveMQ and Kafka — differ: protocols, message models, delivery guarantees and partitions.
Word of the Day — Idempotency
A quick primer on idempotency: what this property of operations is, why it matters for system reliability, and where it shows up — from HTTP methods to databases and blockchain.