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Distributed Systems: Building Software for the Real World
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Explore architecting, designing, and building resilient distributed systems for real-world challenges. Gain insights into creating stability, designing for production, delivering systems, and solving systemic issues.

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In this course, you will examine ways to architect, design, and build software —particularly distributed systems—for the muck and mire of the real world. You will prepare for the armies of illogical users who do crazy, unpredictable things. Your software will be under attack from the moment you release it. It needs to stand up to the typhoon winds of flash mobs or the crushing pressure of a DDoS attack by poorly secured IoT toaster ovens. You’ll take a hard look at software that failed the test and find ways to make sure your software survives contact with the real world. The course is divided into four parts, each introduced by a case study. In Part I: Create Stability you’ll see how to keep your systems alive, maintaining system uptime. In Part II: Design for Production, you’ll see what it means to live in production. In Part III: Deliver Your System, you’ll look at deployments. In Part IV: Solve Systemic Problems, you’ll examine the system’s ongoing life as part of the overall information ecosystem.

In this course, you will examine ways to architect, design, and build software —particularly distributed systems—for the muck an...Show More

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

Understand system architecture and information architecture

Learn about development lifecycle and different architectures to build a software

Learn about stability anti-patterns, problems in network connection and their vulnerabilities

Learn service discovery systems, control plane, bounded/unbounded result sets and their effects

Understand system architecture and information architecture

TAKEAWAY SKILLS

Software Engineering

Distributed Systems

Content

189 Lessons89 Quizzes

Living in Production

4 Lessons

Step through readiness for production, holistic design, and pragmatic architecture in software.

Introduction

Scope and Overall Development Lifecycle

Pragmatic Architecture

Quiz

The Exception That Grounded an Airline

9 Lessons

Solve challenges with a case study on resolving airline system outages and preventing failures.

Case Study: The Exception That Grounded an Airline

An Ounce of Prevention

Quiz

Stabilize Your System

7 Lessons

Break apart strategies to maintain stability, prevent failures, and ensure system longevity.

Real World Problems

Defining Stability

Expanding System Lifespan

Failure Modes

Stopping Crack Propagation

Chain Of Failure

Quiz

Stability Antipatterns

13 Lessons

Break down complex ideas on stability antipatterns in distributed systems and mitigation strategies.

Antipatterns

Integration points

Socket Based Protocols

Network Connection

The 5 AM Problem

TCP With Firewall

Socket Connection Failure

HTTP Protocols

Vendor API Libraries

Countering Integration Point Problems

Chain Reactions

Avoid Failures

Quiz

Failures And Blockages

19 Lessons

Take a closer look at handling failures and blockages in distributed systems to ensure resilience.

Deadlock And Bad Users

Unbalanced Capacities

Drive Out Through Testing

Dogpile

Quiz

Force Multiplier

6 Lessons

Investigate safeguards and strategies to prevent failures in automated distributed systems.

Outage Amplification

Controls and Safeguards

Slow Responses

Unbounded Result Sets

Reasons for unbound result set

Quiz

Stability Patterns

17 Lessons

Master the steps to ensuring system stability through timeouts, circuit breakers, bulkheads, and effective resource management.

Timeouts

Timeouts Side Effects And Latency problems

More About Test Harness and Failure Modes

Decoupling Middleware

Launching An Online Store

8 Lessons

Address challenges of online store launch, load testing, traffic management, and server diagnostics during peak retail events.

Calendars

My First Holiday Load Test

Taking the Pulse

Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday

Foundations

9 Lessons

Walk through the fundamentals of distributed systems, including virtualization, containers, and cloud environments.

Physical Fundamentals

NICs and Names

Programming for Multiple Networks

Virtual Machines in the Data Center

Containers in the Data Center

The 12-Factor App

Virtual Machines in the Cloud

Containers in the Cloud

Quiz

10.

Processes on Machines

9 Lessons

Examine the essentials of deploying, managing, and monitoring distributed system processes on machines.

Deployment and Runtime View

Code

Configuration

Transparency

Designing for Transparency

Enabling Technologies and Logging

Human Readability of Log Files and Voodoo Operations

Instance Metrics and Health Checks

Quiz

11.

Interconnect

12 Lessons

Grasp the fundamentals of interconnect layers, DNS, load balancing, demand control, and service discovery.

Interconnect Layer

DNS

Global Server Load Balancing with DNS

Availability Of DNS And Load Balancing

Software and Hardware Load Balancing

Migratory Virtual IP Addresses

Quiz

12.

Control Plane

14 Lessons

Take a closer look at the control plane's role in managing and automating distributed systems.

Mechanical Advantage

System Failure, Not Human Error

Automation Goes Really Fast

Platform and Ecosystem

Development Is Production

System-Wide Transparency

Economic Value

The Risk of Fragmentation and Logs/Stats

What to Expose

Configuration Services

Provisioning and Deployment Services

Command and Control

The Platform Players

Quiz

13.

Security

11 Lessons

Implement measures to enhance security in distributed systems, mitigating breaches and vulnerabilities effectively.

Security Breaches

Broken Authentication and Session Management

Cross-Site Scripting

Broken Access Control

Security Misconfiguration

Sensitive Data Exposure

Cross-Site Request Forgery

The Principle of Least Privilege

Configured Passwords

Waiting for Godot

Quiz

14.

Design for Deployment

10 Lessons

Master deployment strategies, minimize downtime, ensure system stability, and enhance user experience.

Planned Downtime

Automated Deployments

Continuous Deployment

Phases of Deployment

Relational Database Schemata

Schemaless Databases

Web Assets

Rollout

Cleanup and Deploy Like the Pros

Quiz

15.

Handling Versions

5 Lessons

Try out strategies for handling versions and maintaining API compatibility in distributed systems.

Non-breaking API changes

Gap Between Documentation and Actual Implementation

Breaking API Changes

Handle Others’ Versions

Quiz

16.

Case Study: Trampled by Your Own Customers

6 Lessons

Walk through the challenges and resolutions in launching and stabilizing a new online system.

17.

Adaptation

8 Lessons

Work your way through adapting software for changes, efficient processes, effective teams, and service autonomy.

Convex Returns

Process and Organization

18.

System Architecture

7 Lessons

Grasp the fundamentals of resilient, adaptable system architecture principles and modularity.

Evolutionary Architecture

19.

Information Architecture

6 Lessons

Deepen your knowledge of flexible information architecture, focusing on databases, events, services, URLs, and data plurality.

Databases

Messages, Events, and Commands

Services Control Their Identifiers

URL Dualism

Embrace Plurality

Quiz

20.

Chaos Engineering

8 Lessons

Follow the process of using chaos engineering to enhance resilience in distributed systems.

Production Environment Problems

Antecedents of Chaos Engineering

The Simian Army

Adopting Your Own Monkey

21.

Bibliography

1 Lessons

Build on foundational literature in databases, software architecture, Agile development, and system design.

References

Certificate of Completion

Showcase your accomplishment by sharing your certificate of completion.

Course Author:

The Pragmatic Programmers

Developed by MAANG Engineers

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Distributed Systems: Building Software for the Real World Save

Distributed Systems: Building Software for the Real World
Save