Be it a fitness brand, an ecommerce store, or even a live streaming platform, starting from scratch is natural. Amazon started by selling books. Dropbox started with a server. Even Google started with a search algorithm.

However, what made these projects harbor worldwide success over the years? Certainly, several factors played a role in their growth, but one major underlying factor most people don’t notice is their scalability. Yes, they amassed massive growth, but they were also capable of addressing this growth without hindering their operations.

Even now, thousands of companies are facing and addressing the issue of growth and scaling, But what exactly is scaling? In simple terms, scaling refers to the management of resources and speed to ensure infrastructure is ready to meet a sudden or expected market surge.

Merely understanding this won’t help your organization ensure its scalability for longevity. To do that, you must comprehend the concept of architecting a large scale system. On that note, let’s spread some light on how you can do so.

The Meaning of Developing a Scalable Architecture

Contrary to popular belief, scaling and growth are not synonymous. Growth refers to adding resources to manage new revenue streams. It means the company is spreading its output, reach, and revenue by means like additional human resources, better technology, etc.

On the other hand, scaling means growing without increasing your concurring costs, leading to an increase in profit. The idea is to maintain the organizational structure while improving production and speed. 

Scaling a large architecture means you are readying the organization for both a steady growth stream and an overnight consumer surge. While the latter is achieved rarely, keeping a flexible approach only adds to your company’s efficiency. 

Factors Every Developer Must Consider When Designing a System 

Now that you know why architecting a large scale system is crucial, take a look at several pivotal factors to keep in mind while designing the system.

1. The number of concurrent users session, operations, transactions, and operations it can support

2. The utilization of resources, such as memory, Thread, CPU, etc

3. The time consumed per action, like getting information from the server

4. The system’s availability at any given time

5. The impact of a server, resources, or service going down

6. The cost and time consumption for the system’s development and maintenance

7. Whether the system is capable of handling a huge amount of data

8. What are the scalability requirement for the system

9. What’s the throughput requirement i.e, the number of requests per second

Role of the Architecture

Architecture plays a crucial role in the grand scheme of system management and scaling. There are several pivotal decisions to be taken, and that too in different aspects. Here is a quick overview of the facets:

1. The architecture decides how and which integrations the application will support

2. It also plays a role in the security compliance for applications, like GDPR, HIPAA, SOC, PCI etc, 

3. The architecture team must perform adequate R&D with multiple frameworks performance to find the ideal solution

4. A proper understanding of the domain is required when choosing an architecture

Type of Systems/Architecture:

Monolithic systems:

A monolithic system means the logic, database, and UI layer stay in one server. It is a common mistake that many developers make since it is fairly appealing due to its time-saving properties. In addition, a monolithic architecture even bodes well with small programs.

However, the approach is bound to pose some severe issues when you try to scale your system. Thus, it is critical that you place a full-fledged structure from the get-go.

Distributed Systems / Microservice Architecture

A distributed system refers to the collection of computer programs that use computational resources throughout separate computation nodes to reach a common, shared objective. These systems try to eradicate failure points and bottlenecks from a system.

Opt for Microservice Architecture 

A microservice architecture is a popular distributed system type, as it decomposes apps into multiple services or components. A suitable example for this would be a business possessing microservice architecture services that relate to different features, like users, products, payments, etc. These features are where every corresponding component manages the business logic for accountability.

A microservice architecture prepares multiple redundant replicas of these services, ensuring there is no central failure point. 

CAP Theorem (Consistency, Availability, Portioning)

According to the CAP theorem, a distributed data store cannot simultaneously offer more than two out of these three characteristics – Consistency, Availability, and Portioning. Out of these three, partitioning is the one that cannot be avoided, since we cannot ensure the safety of network connections due to real-world restrictions.

Thus, you must choose between consistency and availability. Depending on the system’s requirements, the architecture team will choose between a CP (consistency and partition tolerance) or AP (availability and partition tolerance.)

Choosing Between Consistencies

As the name suggests, an eventual consistency takes place eventually. For example, a payment conducted on an online app releases the cashback within an apt amount of time. The brief period allows the system to undertake other functionalities, keeping it seamlessly functional.

On the other hand, a strict consistency means almost instantaneous procedure. Continuing the above example, it refers to the payment functionality, which in most cases, must be instant. Message queueing is a great way to improve strict consistency’s performance. It refers to the buffering of messages in queues for a future release to customers, which gives producers time to be decoupled from them.

Both consistencies have separate roles, so the architecture team must use the tech stack depending on this in a microservices architecture.

System’s Resiliency to Recover after Crash

Your system’s resiliency to recover after a crash also plays a huge role in the microservice architecture. Based on the architecture team’s choice, you can receive a notification or limit the number of requests within a fixed period. This determines how long the system will uphold or consume time to recover after a crash. 

Tips to Build a Scalable Technology System

Ready to prepare a scalable system? Do it right the first time by following these tips.

Separate Functionality

Separating your website and some of its functions is also a viable solution to practice scaling. Dropbox is a great example that can be referenced here, as the cloud-based workspace made several downloading and uploading functions separate from their platform. 

Naturally, the approach will vary based on your business nature and objective. The key is to separate some heavy-duty functions from the primary platform for smoother function execution.

Implement Cloud Solutions

Speaking of Dropbox, adding cloud solutions to your system can address the auto-scaling needs. However, that does not mean you simply sign a deal from the cloud service provider. Assess the package and choose features that stay viable for your future requirements as well.

Apply the Duplication Approach

One way to avoid future scaling issues is by approaching them using duplication. What does that mean? It means that your technology can go from 100 to 100 million by simply launching more databases or servers or even both without changing the entire code.

For instance, developers can replicate a website on different servers while using a load balancer to moderate traffic.

Consider IoT and AI Integration

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT) are two of the most popular and application-rich technologies in the modern market. You can use them to handle and analyze customer data & requests.

In addition, tools like chatbots can eliminate the need of hiring additional customer support executives for FAQs. It saves time and resources now, and in the future by allowing you to allocate your resources smartly.

In Conclusion: Scalability is a Long-Term Perk You Must Integrate

Taking a business towards success takes time, effort, and resources. However, all this can go to waste if you have not scaled your infrastructure. Architecting a large scale system from the start ensures your application and even organization stays relevant and functional for a long time.

BigStep Technologies is a hub for 200+ professionals from multiple industries. Our experts can help you find the ideal solutions to prepare and execute a scaling strategy in the most effective manner. 

Interested in doing so? Mail us at info@bigsteptech.com to avail of the opportunity today.