In our recent blog post Databases are legacy. It's time to rethink data storage and usage, we explored the current landscape and the need to rethink how we deal with data, dropping the legacy definition of a database and instead focusing on the concept of a developer data platform. Let me recap the elements of a developer data platform.

The Developer Data Platform​

If we were to go back and redesign the core systems we use to store, access, and use data with what we know now, we would build a completely different experience. Instead of adding more disparate components and bolt-ons, we need a new solution to handle the modern requirements. We need a Data Platform purpose-build for Developers with the following characteristics:

1. Has the capabilities to meet the demands of a multi-model application.
2. Data stored is optimized for application access patterns, not the application designed to adhere to the database's preferred patterns.
3. All data is queryable and searchable directly from common application frameworks (the tools, libraries, and packages developers use daily) and APIs without learning a new language.
4. Data is sharable in common formats for end users, applications, APIs, and services in real time.
5. Infrastructureless from the developers' perspective: indexing, sharding, HA, recovery, and standard database administration operations are handled automatically.
6. Built with modern cloud-native architecture with independently scalable components.
7. Provides control of their data to the users in a secure way that complies with laws and regulations.

Tigris - the Open Source Developer Data Platform​

We built Tigris to meet these characteristics. Tigris is an open source developer data platform that replaces the need for having separate systems to support each disparate data model, data storage, event streaming, global search, and infrastructure management. It provides a cohesive, flexible set of tools for application developers to take an idea from production without stepping into the sinkhole of data pipelines, broken sync jobs, and complicated concurrency bugs present in many modern application architectures. Tigris is truly cloud-native, allowing separate components to be scaled on-demand independently. It provides a serverless experience where developers can focus on building new applications while storing and retrieving data with a simple but powerful universal API.

By providing the most common tools developers need to build data-rich applications and doing it through a developer-friendly interface, we can enable them to focus on building applications and stop worrying about the data infrastructure.

Now, let's look at a few classic application architectures and see how Tigris simplifies them and eliminates the infrastructure sprawl.

Simplifying the backend architecture of a new mobile game​

Classic architecture without Tigris​

Let's look at an example of a team building a new mobile game. We will call the game X for brevity. When the team starts building X, they focus on the fundamental game elements. They want to make a fun, compelling, and successful game. While a lot of work goes into the UI and the core play elements, they also realize early in development that they need a database to store inventory, state, etc. The team adds a MongoDB database to keep that data persistent. The development process speeds ahead. As they are near having the core game done, they want to add those extra features that most games have.

The first component on the list that game X needs is the ability to handle micro-transactions and allow people to buy in-game items. This means that in-app purchases need to connect to external services, be processed, and update the game data. Not only that, the transaction will need to be logged in the accounting system and the ancillary logging systems. The team looks to messaging or event streaming services to support the interconnectivity of different internal and external micro-services. This may take something like RabbitMQ, Apache Kafka, Apache Pulsar, or others, allowing different services to easily receive and act upon inflight data.

When money is introduced into a game, the likelihood that gamers will start to abuse the game increases dramatically. This leads to developing log processing services, analytics, and other tools to search and find problems from logged data. This adds a few other components to the infrastructure, including an analytics platform like Snowflake and a tool like Elasticsearch to search through large amounts of logs. Now, as the team is dealing with financial data on top of game data, they need a rock-solid backend data store for the financial data, so they include Postgres in the mix.

As you can see, the sprawl quickly adds up, and we are now looking at a complex application architecture with multiple moving pieces.

Developers working on GameX need to know the tools, languages, and frameworks to build the core game. On top of that, now they also need to learn, maintain, and troubleshoot MongoDB, Redis, Postgres, Elasticsearch, and Kafka. Not only do these components need to be managed independently, but they also need to work in unison. For example, there are data pipelines and synchronization jobs to manage and maintain, to ensure the data is consistent across these systems.

The result is developers spend more time managing infrastructure and performing operations (DevOps) and less time shipping features.

Modern architecture with Tigris​

Tigris dramatically reduces the complexity and removes the operational burden on developers. Tigris replaces the need for Mobile Game X to deploy separate systems for caching, search, data persistence, and event streaming.

With Tigris, developers don't spend time on infrastructure operations (DevOps). Instead, they spend their time doing what they do best - building.

Simplifying the backend architecture of an e-commerce application​

Classic architecture without Tigris​

On the surface, e-commerce sites may appear simple, but under the hood, they require a rich set of data-intensive features and an event-driven application architecture to keep them running smoothly. Let's walk through what the application looks like with a classic take on the architecture.

For our site, we store our product details, reviews, and other pertinent information about the products themselves in a MongoDB cluster. We also deploy a caching layer for the product catalog to deliver a low-latency user experience. We use Redis for the cache. Users need to be able to search for products and reviews, so we built a product search service backed by Elasticsearch. We need ACID transactional guarantees for some user flows, resulting in Postgres' introduction.

One of the critical user flows is the order processing flow. It needs to be event-driven as it needs to interact with external services, such as payment processors, shipping service providers, and others. The payment status, refund status, and shipping status need to trigger different business logic in the application. We chose Kafka to support this event-driven architecture.

All of this adds up fast, and we are now again looking at a complex application architecture with multiple moving pieces.

Modern architecture with Tigris​

Tigris dramatically simplifies the application architecture for an e-commerce application by combining the most commonly used components in an open source developer data platform, supporting multiple models and data access patterns. With a single, unified API that spans search, event streaming, and transactional document store, along with innovative features like automatic indexing, Tigris enables developers to focus on building their applications and stop spending time on infrastructure operations (DevOps).

Tigris: a modern approach to application data architecture​

Modern application requirements require a modern approach to data management that is developer-first! As you can see in the examples above, Tigris simplifies the application architecture. It shifts the burden of managing infrastructure operations away from the developers, so they can focus on building applications and creating rich experiences for their users.

Tigris is the all-in-one open source developer data platform. Use it as a scalable transactional document store. Perform real-time search across your data stores automatically. Build event-driven apps with real-time event streaming. All provided to you through a unified serverless API enabling you to focus on building applications and stop worrying about the data infrastructure.

Get early access and try out Tigris for your next application. You can also follow the documentation to learn more.