MLA 013 Tech Stack for Customer-Facing M...

Client Applications

• React is recommended as the primary web front-end framework due to its compositional structure, best practice enforcement, and strong community support.
• React Native is used for mobile applications, enabling code reuse and a unified JavaScript codebase for web, iOS, and Android clients.
• Using React and React Native simplifies development by allowing most UI logic to be written in a single language.

Server (Backend) Options

• The episode encourages starting with serverless frameworks, such as AWS Amplify or GCP Firebase, for rapid scaling, built-in authentication, and security.
  • Amplify allows seamless integration with React and handles authentication, user management, and database access directly from the client.
  • When direct client-to-database access is insufficient, custom business logic can be implemented using AWS Lambda or Google Cloud Functions without managing entire servers.
• Only when serverless frameworks are insufficient should developers consider managing their own server code.
  • Recommended traditional backend options include Node.js with Express for JavaScript environments or FastAPI for Python-centric projects, both offering strong concurrency support.
  • Using Docker to containerize server code and deploying via managed orchestration (e.g., AWS ECS/Fargate) provides flexibility and migration capability beyond serverless.
  • Python's FastAPI is advised for developers heavily invested in the Python ecosystem, especially if machine learning code is also in Python.

Database and Supporting Infrastructure

• Postgres is recommended as the primary relational database, owing to its advanced features, community momentum, and versatility.
  • Postgres can serve multiple infrastructure functions beyond storage, including job queue management and pub/sub (publish-subscribe) messaging via specific database features.
• NoSQL options such as MongoDB are only recommended when hierarchical, non-tabular data models or specific performance optimizations are necessary.
• For situations requiring in-memory session management or real-time messaging, Redis is suggested, but Postgres may suffice for many use cases.
• Job queuing can be accomplished with external tools like RabbitMQ or AWS SQS, but Postgres also supports job queuing via transactional locks.

Cloud Hosting and Server Management

• Serverless deployment abstracts away infrastructure operations, improving scalability and reducing ongoing server management and security burdens.
  • Serverless functions scale automatically and only incur charges during execution.
• Amplify and Firebase offer out-of-the-box user authentication, database, and cloud function support, while custom authentication can be handled with tools like AWS Cognito.
• Managed database hosting (e.g., AWS RDS for Postgres) simplifies backups, scaling, and failover but is distinct from full serverless paradigms.

Evolution of Web Architectures

• The episode contrasts older monolithic frameworks (Django, Ruby on Rails) with current microservice and serverless architectures.
• Developers are encouraged to leverage modern tools where possible, adopting serverless and cloud-managed components until advanced customization requires traditional servers.

Links

Client

• React for web client
• create-react-app: quick-start React setup
• React Bootstrap: CSS framework (alternatives: Tailwind, Chakra, MaterialUI)
• react-router and easy-peasy as useful plugins
• React Native for mobile apps

Server

• AWS Amplify for serverless web and mobile backends
• GCP Firebase
• AWS Serverless (underlying building blocks)
• AWS Lambda for serverless functions
• ECR, Fargate, Route53, ELB for containerized deployment

Database, Job-Queues, Sessions

• Postgres as the primary relational database
• Redis for session-management and pub/sub
• RabbitMQ or SQS for job queuing (with wrapper: Celery)