Scalability Rules

Preface viii Acknowledgments xiii About the Authors xiv 1 Reduce the Equation 1 2 Distribute Your Work 23 3 Design to Scale Out Horizontally 35 4 Use the Right Tools 53 5 Don't Duplicate Your Work 71 6 Use Caching Aggressively 87 7 Learn from Your Mistakes 113 8 Database Rules 129 9 Design for Fault Tolerance and Graceful Failure 147 10 Avoid or Distribute State 167 11 Asynchronous Communication and Message Buses 179 12 Miscellaneous Rules 193 13 Rule Review and Prioritization 213 Index 247

Martin L. Abbott, formerly COO of Quigo, spent nearly six years at eBay, most recently as SVP of Technology/CTO. He has held engineering, management, and executive positions at Gateway and Motorola. Michael T. Fisher, a veteran software and technology executive, spent two years as CTO of Quigo. Previously, as VP of Engineering & Architecture for PayPal, he led 200+ developers. Abbott and Fisher co-authored The Art of Scalability (Addison-Wesley).

"Once again, Abbott and Fisher provide a book that I'll be giving to our engineers. It's an essential read for anyone dealing with scaling an online business." --Chris Lalonde, VP, Technical Operations and Infrastructure Architecture, Bullhorn "Abbott and Fisher again tackle the difficult problem of scalability in their unique and practical manner. Distilling the challenges of operating a fast-growing presence on the Internet into 50 easy-to understand rules, the authors provide a modern cookbook of scalability recipes that guide the reader through the difficulties of fast growth." --Geoffrey Weber, Vice President, Internet Operations, Shutterfly "Abbott and Fisher have distilled years of wisdom into a set of cogent principles to avoid many nonobvious mistakes." --Jonathan Heiliger, VP, Technical Operations, Facebook "In The Art of Scalability, the AKF team taught us that scale is not just a technology challenge. Scale is obtained only through a combination of people, process, and technology. With Scalability Rules, Martin Abbott and Michael Fisher fill our scalability toolbox with easily implemented and time-tested rules that once applied will enable massive scale." --Jerome Labat,VP, Product Development IT, Intuit "When I joined Etsy, I partnered with Mike and Marty to hit the ground running in my new role, and it was one of the best investments of time I have made in my career. The indispensable advice from my experience working with Mike and Marty is fully captured here in this book. Whether you're taking on a role as a technology leader in a new company or you simply want to make great technology decisions, Scalability Rules will be the go-to resource on your bookshelf." --ChadDickerson, CTO, Etsy "Scalability Rules provides an essential set of practical tools and concepts anyone can use when designing, upgrading, or inheriting a technology platform. It's very easy to focus on an immediate problem and overlook issues that will appear in the future. This book