chapter six
6 Foundations of distributed system design
This chapter covers
- Architectural paradigms, from monoliths and layered designs to microservices
- The CAP theorem and various consistency models
- Vertical and horizontal scaling, load balancing, and autoscaling
- Distributed and multi-tier caching strategies
- Data replication, sharding, and partitioning techniques
- Communication, observability, and monitoring in distributed systems
Jane continues her interview preparation. Although primarily a frontend engineer, she has overheard full-stack and backend engineers discussing distributed system issues and has even resolved a few minor related bugs. By diving deeper into this material, she aims to strengthen her understanding and bridge the gap between frontend and backend concerns. Of course, she also wants to excel in interviews to earn the opportunity to work on modern enterprise-level architectures.