If You Have yet to Think About Microservices, You Are Already Behind

In today’s world - companies are expected to deploy software and services at a rapidly increasing rate. This drive for innovation is forcing many enterprises to rethink their current architectural structures. If your company has not yet considered the benefits of microservices, you are currently being left behind.

MONOLITHIC ARCHITECTURE

In order to understand the benefit of microservices, it is useful to first compare it to the standard, monolithic style. Normally, enterprise applications are often built as a single unit. The unit is made up of three main parts:

• A client facing interface - HTML pages, JavaScript running in a browser on the end-users machine
• A database
• A server-side application - handles HTTP requests, retrieves and updates data from the database, and populates the HTML to be sent to the browser.

This has long been the natural way to build an application. The few advantages of monolithic architecture pail in comparison with the cons. When components are tightly coupled and intertwined, it is difficult to isolate services, maintain code, and apply quick bug fixes. Large monolithic code bases break down easily and is difficult to understand and modify for new developers joining the team. Monolithic applications have slower times to market, are adverse to chance, and are extremely difficult to scale. This rigidity decreases the quality of the code over time.

MICROSERVICE ARCHITECTURE

In order to compete in these days of digital transformation and continuous deployment - it is imperative to migrate your company to a microservice architecture.

The microservices style of architecture develops complex application software from small, individual applications that communicate with each other using language-independent interfaces (APIs). Microservices break down complex tasks into smaller processes that work independently of each other. Microservices allow rapid changes and short release times along with high scalability and autonomous teams.

By utilizing microservices and DevOps, Amazon engineers deploy code every 11.7 seconds, on average—reducing both the number and duration of outages at the same time. Netflix engineers deploy code thousands of times per day. 

The microservices framework promotes a truly innovative, deployment-friendly environment. Whereas traditional IT is decidedly monolithic, forward-thinking companies like Box are adapting microservices and boldly spearheading digital transformation.