You Keep Using That Word • Sam Newman • GOTO 2024

Words like “asynchronous” and “synchronous” have multiple competing definitions, especially in the context of inter-process communication, leading to confusion and misunderstandings

Rather than using ambiguous terms, focus on describing specific behaviors and requirements:

• Temporal coupling/decoupling
• Blocking vs non-blocking
• Latency requirements
• Response handling needs

Brokers and intermediaries enable:

• Temporal decoupling
• Guaranteed message delivery
• Parallel processing
• Better scalability
• Improved system robustness

Stateless processing is preferable to stateful processing for distributed systems:

• Easier to scale
• More resilient
• Better suited for parallel operations

Context is crucial for effective communication about system design:

• Define terms explicitly within your team
• Focus on describing desired behaviors and outcomes
• Use more precise terminology instead of overloaded terms
• Consider the specific needs of your application

Non-blocking operations can improve performance but:

• May still require waiting for responses
• Don’t automatically solve all problems
• Need to consider failure scenarios
• Should match actual application requirements

Event-driven systems tend to be:

• More loosely coupled
• Better at handling scale
• More complex to reason about
• Harder to debug and maintain

When designing system interactions, consider:

• Required response times
• Failure scenarios
• State management
• Message delivery guarantees
• User experience needs