Every team has its own approach to finishing a project, whether it be an agile approach or a waterfall approach. However, the idea of microservices has become increasingly popular in the DevOps world. Simply put, in a microservice set up, each person on the team focuses on a single job or service. Together, each service comes together to build an application, often through continuous integration and APIs. Think of an assembly line, puzzle pieces, building blocks or a pitstop. Implementing a microservice architecture has many advantages including scalability and independent components, but just because it’s a hot topic in DevOps, doesn’t mean it’s ideal for your team.
Advantages
Imagine only having to focus on one task and doing it really well. This is essentially the foundation of a microservice architecture. Developers focus on one component of an application. This allows for a quicker time-to-market and more efficiency in bug fixing, testing, and introducing new features. Developers can work on a single part of an application without affecting anyone else’s task. And if one part of the application goes down, it doesn’t take the whole ship with it. This is possible through containerization. Other advantages include:
- Decoupled services
- Independent data storage
- Compressed development and testing
Challenges
Although the idea of microservices seems ideal on the surface, there are certain things to think about before making the jump. It’s common for teams to start out with too many services. In this case, less is more. It’s better to start with a few services and split off to resolve a problem. Overwhelming your team with too many services can slow down the development process and decrease efficiency.
Independence is the keyword here. One of the biggest benefits of microservices is the fact that each service does not affect another. This is because each service accesses its own database. Accessing a single database via multiple services is not recommended, rather teams should implement APIs for services to collaborate.
Are Microservices Right For You?
Start small when creating microservices. Michael Hamrah, Chief Architect of Namely, highlights 4 aspects for teams to consider first:
- Consider the limitations and the APIs associated with a service.
- Microservices should be independent of one another. This allows services to operate without the affects of another; this is possible through “loose coupling.”
- Microservices should add value. Consider value stream mapping – can microservices help you eliminate waste or will they only create more?
- Each service should work properly and be monitored. Although if one goes down it won’t affect other services, that means you must maintain all services separately.
A microservice infrastructure is just one of many ways to streamline your DevOps workflow, but is it the right way? Talk to Sevaa Group about a consultation. Whether it’s development, maintenance, or marketing, we can advise your team on best practices.
