D and microservices

[Joakim via Digitalmars-d]

On Tuesday, 6 October 2015 at 19:07:32 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> Felt stupid for not being hip to this "microservices" thing you 
> say, so just looked it up. But it sounds to me like it's 
> basically just a buzz-driven rediscovery of the basic 
> principles of proper encapsulation and Unix philosophy ("do one 
> thing and do it well").
>
> (Kinda like how "cloud" sounds like a big fancy new revolution 
> until you realize it's just the hip new word for "internet" or 
> "hosted". Or "Facade design pattern" vs plain old "It's a thin 
> wrapper".)
>
> Does that sound about accurate, or am I missing something?

Heh, funny you say that, since Russel's post just got me to look 
up the term too. :) I had encountered the term before, when I was 
talking to a dev shop about a project earlier this year, but 
figured it was exactly what it sounded like and didn't bother 
looking it up till now.  Looks like I was right.

Whatever hype may be involved, at least they're re-branding 
something _useful_, just be grateful for that. ;)

On Wednesday, 7 October 2015 at 10:39:07 UTC, Russel Winder wrote:
>> (Kinda like how "cloud" sounds like a big fancy new revolution 
>> until
>> you
>> realize it's just the hip new word for "internet" or "hosted". 
>> Or
>> "Facade design pattern" vs plain old "It's a thin wrapper".)
>
> "Cloud" is really a destruction of personal computing in favour 
> of re- centralization of all computing: put the computing power 
> back in the hands of the people who want to control what you 
> may or may not do with computers. Beyond this is gets political.

I wouldn't go that far.  Users want to access their data from 
anywhere on their mobile devices, and given that those mobile 
devices can't store much, the cloud is just the most convenient 
place to put the data, now that 4G speeds are comparable to wired 
broadband from just a couple years ago (except for the much lower 
quotas on wireless, which only really limit you with video).

You could have made the same argument a couple decades ago, that 
PCs were a step back from workstations, because the old UNIX 
workstations came with compilers and a toolchain that let you 
build your own software whereas you had to go get the tools for 
your PC, ie they weren't bundled.  Some people make the same 
argument with the even more locked-down tablets today, where you 
can't even develop software using them.

But the truth is that most PC users weren't developing software 
or exerting much "control" over their desktops/laptops, and 
almost nobody wants to develop software or create on a mobile 
device.  They welcome more locked-down systems, because it lets 
them do the lighter tasks they actually want to get done much 
easier, without worrying about configuring the system just right, 
ie complexity, or viruses.

However, I do agree with you that the cloud is way overplayed, 
just for different reasons.  I think decentralized computing is 
going to take off instead, with a decentralized social network, 
like Diaspora except running peer-to-peer on your mobile devices, 
replacing centralized Facebook.  Cloud will merely be one of the 
nodes in that decentralized network, one where you offload heavy 
computing activity or data that you need from everywhere else, 
but not the center of mass that many treat it as today.