18 December 2018
Azure Functions only provides direct support for a narrow range of authentication providers. If you want to use an external token provider or custom solution, you’ll have to create the plumbing yourself.
27 November 2018
ArchUnit is a java library that provides a fluent API for creating self-testing architectures via unit tests. A similar library can be written for .Net Standard that acts on compiled assemblies rather than raw code.
28 October 2018
Development shops that have invested heavily in WCF have been left high and dry by the emerging .Net Core ecosystem. There are a number of good reasons why WCF for .Net Core is unlikely to make it onto any official roadmaps…
12 October 2018
Event-driven integration can improve the scalability, resilience and scalability of distributed applications… but this does depend on the design of your event messages…
12 September 2018
Service Fabric does support container-based applications, but it still feels more like an application server than a container orchestrator.
30 August 2018
There is a growing sense of unease around how larger organisations have implemented agile. In particular, there is a tendency towards centralised control that can be at odds with the agile preference for individuals over process.
12 August 2018
Twelve factor apps provide a methodology for building apps that are optimised for modern cloud environments. It’s only been achievable in the Microsoft world since the advent of .Net Core.
29 July 2018
It’s easy to get caught up in unrealistic notions that you can re-write a legacy system or gradually decompose it. There are other, more pragmatic approaches that can help to modernise architectures and enable new development.
10 July 2018
Microsoft have added a Kafka façade to Azure Event Hubs, presumably in the hope of luring Kafka users onto its platform. This makes sense as the platforms have a lot in common, though there are some missing Kafka features that may prove critical.
18 June 2018
Fitness functions can be a useful metaphor for guiding an emerging architecture, but you do have to invest in making sure they describe the right outcome.
3 June 2018
Not only are layered applications difficult to maintain, but the common abstractions they are built on tend to give rise to inflexible implementations that have serious scalability challenges.
8 May 2018
You’re rarely given the opportunity to focus on transitioning an architecture to the exclusion of everything else. You may have to get used to the idea that decomposing a monolith is a direction of travel rather than a clear destination.
25 April 2018
REST API design is dependent on the clients that will be consuming the resources - APIs that are designed for server-based integrations tend to look quite different from those that are designed to support mobile applications.
20 March 2018
If you find REST APIs difficult to design, develop and scale, then your experience with GraphQL is not going to be any easier.
9 March 2018
One of the main benefits of microservices is that they reduce the cost of change. The problem is that you need to make a significant up-front investment to realise this saving. Your first few microservices are more likely to be an expensive and potentially painful undertaking.