Walmart Canada claims that it was Microservices that allowed them to replace hardware with virtual servers, reducing costs by somewhere between 20 and 50 percent. Now Slashdot reader snydeq shares an article by a senior systems automation engineer arguing that a microservices approach "offers increased modularity, making applications easier to develop, test, deploy, and, more importantly, change and maintain." The article touts things like cost savings and flexibility for multiple device types, suggesting microservices offer increased resilience and improved scalabiity (not to mention easier debugging and a faster time to market with an incremental development model). But it also warns that organizations need the resources to deploy the new microservices quicky (and the necessary server) -- along with the ability to test and monitor them for database errors, network latency, caching issues and ongoing availability. "You must embrace devops culture," argues the article, adding that "designing for failure is essential... In a traditional setting, developers are focused on features and functionalities, and the operations team is on the hook for production challenges. In devops, everyone is responsible for service provisioning -- and failure." The original submission ends with a question for Slashdot reader. "What cautions do you have to offer for folks considering tapping microservices for their next application?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.