Best of Backend Development — November 2025

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    Article
    Avatar of javarevisitedJavarevisited·25w

    6 Must-Read Books for Backend Developers in 2026

    A curated list of six essential books for backend developers covering software architecture, design patterns, distributed systems, microservices, and data engineering. The recommendations include classics like "Designing Data-Intensive Applications" by Martin Kleppmann, "The Pragmatic Programmer," and "Building Microservices" by Sam Newman, focusing on fundamental principles that remain relevant despite changing frameworks and tools. Each book addresses critical aspects of backend development from API design and scalability to data pipelines and architectural trade-offs.

  2. 2
    Article
    Avatar of hnHacker News·25w

    Why we migrated from Python to Node.js

    A startup rewrote their backend from Python/Django to Node.js/Express one week after launch due to Python's async limitations. The team struggled with Django's incomplete async support, colored functions problem, and the need for constant sync/async conversions. Despite losing Django's ergonomic ORM, they gained 3x throughput, unified their codebase with their existing Node worker service, and improved code maintainability. The three-day migration was driven by concerns about scalability and code quality rather than immediate load issues.

  3. 3
    Article
    Avatar of vladmihalceaVlad Mihalcea·22w

    Just Use Postgres!

    A comprehensive review of Denis Magda's book covering PostgreSQL's capabilities beyond traditional relational features. The 402-page guide explores core database concepts like indexing (B+Tree, hash, partial), transactions, and modern SQL features (CTEs, window functions), then dives into non-relational capabilities including JSON storage and full-text search. The book examines PostgreSQL's extension ecosystem: pgvector for ML/GenAI embeddings, TimescaleDB for time series data, PostGIS for geospatial queries, and pgmq for message queues. Includes performance tuning guidance and discusses when PostgreSQL might not be the right choice.

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    Video
    Avatar of kikisbytesKiki's Bytes·24w

    How Figma Scaled To 10 Million Users

    Figma scaled from a single PostgreSQL database to a horizontally sharded architecture supporting 10 million users. The journey involved three phases: immediate relief through vertical scaling, read replicas, and connection pooling; medium-term stability via logical partitioning of table groups into dedicated databases; and long-term scalability through horizontal sharding with a custom query router. Key innovations included optimized logical replication by removing indexes during migration, two-phase deployment using PG Bouncer for safe routing changes, logical sharding with PostgreSQL views for testing before physical splits, and a custom Golang DB proxy for intelligent query routing across shards.

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    Video
    Avatar of codeheadCodeHead·23w

    Why Dev Projects Use Multiple Languages?

    Modern software projects use multiple programming languages because different languages excel at different tasks. Frontend requires JavaScript for browser compatibility, while backend services benefit from specialized languages like Go for low-latency networking, Python for data science, and Java for enterprise workloads. Major platforms like YouTube, Netflix, and Instagram combine multiple languages strategically. Services communicate through APIs, gRPC, and message queues, with containerization making polyglot architectures practical. Teams choose languages based on performance needs, developer expertise, and existing system compatibility, trading monolithic simplicity for distributed system flexibility.

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    Article
    Avatar of vercelVercel·23w

    Support for Elysia

    Vercel now supports automatic detection and deployment of Elysia, a TypeScript framework with end-to-end type safety. When deployed, Vercel automatically provisions optimal resources and uses Node by default, with optional Bun runtime support via configuration. Deployments leverage Fluid compute with Active CPU pricing, charging only for active CPU usage time.

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    Article
    Avatar of nodejsNode.js·24w

    Node.js — Node.js v24.11.1 (LTS)

    Node.js v24.11.1 (LTS) has been released, addressing a critical issue where Buffer.allocUnsafe was incorrectly zero-filling buffers instead of returning uninitialized memory as documented. The release includes numerous fixes and improvements across benchmarks, build system, dependencies (npm upgraded to 11.6.2, corepack to 0.34.2), documentation, HTTP/HTTP2, inspector, module system, testing framework, and tooling. Additional changes include root certificate updates to NSS 3.116, Visual Studio workload upgrade from 2019 to 2022, and various performance optimizations.

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    Article
    Avatar of bytebytegoByteByteGo·24w

    How Spotify Built Its Data Platform To Understand 1.4 Trillion Data Points

    Spotify processes 1.4 trillion data points daily through a sophisticated data platform that evolved from a single Hadoop cluster to a multi-product system running on Google Cloud. The platform consists of three core components: data collection (capturing events from millions of devices using client SDKs and Kubernetes operators), data processing (running 38,000+ automated pipelines using BigQuery, Flink, and Apache Beam), and data management (ensuring privacy, security, and compliance). The architecture emphasizes self-service capabilities, allowing product teams to define event schemas and deploy infrastructure automatically while maintaining centralized governance. Built-in anonymization, lineage tracking, and quality checks ensure data trustworthiness across financial reporting, personalized recommendations, and experimentation systems.

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    Article
    Avatar of notedNoted·24w

    The 10MB Discord Limit Drove Me to Build a Self-Hosted GPU Video Compressor

    A developer built 8mb.local, a self-hosted video compression tool that solves Discord's 10MB file size limit. The single Docker container includes a SvelteKit UI, FastAPI backend, and Celery worker queue with automatic GPU detection for NVIDIA, Intel, and AMD hardware acceleration. It features target-size-first compression with automatic retry logic, real-time progress streaming via Server-Sent Events, and seamless CPU fallback. Installation requires choosing the appropriate docker-compose configuration for your hardware, with special attention to NVIDIA driver capabilities and reverse proxy buffering settings for proper SSE streaming.

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    Video
    Avatar of tsoding_dailyTsoding Daily·23w

    I tried Protobuf after 17 years of ignoring it

    A developer attempts to use Protocol Buffers for the first time after 17 years of awareness, encountering significant complexity in compilation, linking, and dependency management. The session reveals extensive build challenges including missing runtime libraries, dependency on Abseil, version mismatches, and linking errors. Despite spending over an hour, the developer struggles to compile a simple "hello world" example without using Google's Bazel build system, exposing the library's steep learning curve and infrastructure requirements.

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    Article
    Avatar of convexConvex·24w

    Convex raises $24M to reinvent backends

    Convex announced a $24M Series A funding round led by a16z and Spark Capital to scale their backend platform. The company has grown 10x in customer base and revenue over nine months, with customers ranging from hackathon teams to enterprises. The funding will support hiring, developing new features like OLAP support and local-first sync, and building a sustainable, profitable business. Convex plans to enhance their component marketplace, improve their open-source self-hosted edition, and optimize infrastructure costs to ensure long-term viability for customers building on their platform.

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    Video
    Avatar of youtubeYouTube·22w

    Building a Production API in Golang from Scratch (Ecommerce project)

    A comprehensive walkthrough of building a production-ready e-commerce API in Go from scratch. Covers HTTP server setup with Chi router, clean layered architecture (handlers, services, repositories), dependency injection, structured logging with slog, middleware implementation, database schema design for products and orders, RESTful endpoint design, and error handling patterns. Demonstrates practical patterns like graceful configuration management, request ID tracking, and JSON response handling.

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    Video
    Avatar of codeheadCodeHead·24w

    99% Of Devs Are SLEEPING On Kotlin

    Kotlin has evolved beyond its Android origins into a versatile multiplatform language suitable for backend, frontend, and mobile development. Key advantages include built-in null safety, seamless Java interoperability, modern coroutines for asynchronous programming, and the ability to share code across platforms. Companies like Netflix and Pinterest are adopting Kotlin for server-side services due to its safety and productivity benefits. The language offers incremental adoption paths through frameworks like Ktor for backends and Kotlin Multiplatform for cross-platform development, making it a practical choice for teams looking to reduce bugs and improve development velocity.

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    Video
    Avatar of bytegradByteGrad·23w

    The Only Backend For Next.js You Need (Motia)

    Explores when and why to use a separate backend application alongside Next.js for handling long-running tasks, background jobs, scheduled tasks, and real-time streaming. Demonstrates how Motia provides background job processing, cron scheduling, event-driven workflows, observability, and streaming capabilities through a step-based architecture. Shows practical implementation of a translation workflow with AI integration, streaming updates to the UI, and authentication middleware.

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    Video
    Avatar of TechWithTimTech With Tim·23w

    Is PHP the best back end language for you to use?

    PHP remains a practical choice for backend development despite its reputation. It powers a significant portion of the web, particularly small business websites and platforms like WordPress. The language offers strong job opportunities, especially for maintaining legacy systems and e-commerce sites, with relatively few new developers entering the field creating demand for PHP skills.

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    Video
    Avatar of codeheadCodeHead·23w

    10 Concepts EVERY Backend Dev Should Know

    Covers 10 fundamental backend development concepts including authentication vs authorization, rate limiting, database indexes, ACID transactions, caching strategies, message queues, load balancing, CAP theorem, reverse proxies, and CDNs. Explains how each concept solves real-world problems like security, performance, scalability, and reliability in production systems.

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    Video
    Avatar of youtubeYouTube·24w

    How to Master System Design Like a Senior Engineer (From Foundations to Production)

    Comprehensive guide covering system design fundamentals from single-server setups to production-scale architectures. Explores core concepts including API design patterns (REST, GraphQL, gRPC), database selection (SQL vs NoSQL), scaling strategies (vertical vs horizontal), load balancing algorithms, caching, and protocol choices (HTTP, WebSockets, AMQP). Demonstrates how to design systems that handle millions of users, make architectural trade-offs, and build fault-tolerant infrastructure with practical examples of each component.

  18. 18
    Article
    Avatar of telerikTelerik·25w

    Building NestJS Applications Following the CQRS Model

    A comprehensive guide to implementing Command Query Responsibility Segregation (CQRS) pattern in NestJS applications. Covers the fundamentals of CQRS architecture, comparing it with traditional CRUD/layered approaches, and walks through building a voting application using the @nestjs/cqrs module. Explains core concepts including commands, queries, events, handlers, event buses, sagas, and the AggregateRoot pattern with practical code examples.

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    Article
    Avatar of javarevisitedJavarevisited·25w

    Top 10 YouTube Channels to Follow for Java in 2025

    A curated list of 10 YouTube channels for learning Java in 2025, ranging from official sources like the Java and Spring channels to educational creators like Java Brains, in28minutes, and Programming with Mosh. The list covers resources for all skill levels, from absolute beginners to advanced developers, with channels focusing on core Java, Spring ecosystem, microservices, backend development, and cloud integration. Each recommendation includes the channel's purpose and target audience.

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    Article
    Avatar of nordicapisNordic APIs·24w

    4 Popular APIs With Great Naming Conventions

    Consistent naming conventions in APIs significantly improve developer experience and AI agent consumability. Four well-designed APIs demonstrate effective practices: Amadeus Hotel List API uses kebab-case for resources with clear versioning; OpenWeatherMap API employs intuitive, jargon-free naming with hierarchical URI structure; Spotify Web API follows clear patterns with plural nouns for collections and singleton resources; and Stripe API maintains consistency across its massive resource catalog. Key principles include using predictable case conventions (kebab-case for URIs, camelCase for parameters), including version numbers, avoiding special characters, using plural nouns for collections, and maintaining hierarchical structure with forward slashes.

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