Learn how to scale data-intensive applications effectively with this exclusive excerpt from Martin Kleppmann and Chris Riccomini.

The New Stack is a publication covering trends and technologies in cloud-native development, DevOps, and software delivery. Developers can learn about containerization, Kubernetes, and cloud computing, as well as explore topics such as microservices architecture, serverless computing, and continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines.

The New Stack

An excerpt from the second edition of 'Designing Data-Intensive Applications' by Martin Kleppmann and Chris Riccomini, covering scalability fundamentals. Key points include: scalability is multidimensional and context-dependent, not a simple label; understanding current load (throughput, read/write ratios, access patterns) is a prerequisite for scaling decisions; shared-memory, shared-disk, and shared-nothing architectures each have distinct trade-offs; there is no universal 'magic scaling sauce' — architecture must match specific application needs; and good principles include decomposing systems into independent components and avoiding unnecessary complexity.

Moving beyond the “magic scaling sauce” myth

Shared-memory, shared-disk, and shared-nothing architectures