Twenty years ago, if you were operating an e-commerce business, a monolithic system was your sole option. These platforms provided a comprehensive, one-size-fits-all solution for websites. However, moving to the present day, this is often insufficient. To meet increasing customer expectations and stay ahead of the competition, a swift and adaptable approach is now essential.
What is a Monolithic E-commerce?
In the realm of e-commerce, a monolith refers to a software architecture where the entire system is tightly integrated into a single, self-contained codebase. This unified structure encompasses various specific e-commerce functions, including data storage and business logic components for cataloguing, pricing, promotions, and order management, as well as presentation and shopper interaction elements like content management and the storefront. Platforms such as Shopify, exemplify this all-in-one approach, enabling businesses to build and launch their e-commerce operations.
All components and features are interconnected and deployed together as a cohesive unit. While this approach simplifies development and deployment, it can present challenges related to scalability, flexibility, and maintainability as the system becomes more complex.
Downsides of Monolithic E-Commerce
Monolithic architectures in e-commerce are often characterised as applications that “grew over time, became unmanageable and difficult to understand, and have low cohesion and high coupling.” As businesses expand, it becomes crucial to assess whether a monolithic platform remains suitable, given the potential downsides.
Keeping Up with Innovation
A significant challenge of e-commerce monoliths is their inability to keep pace with industry innovation. While monolithic architectures may offer stability and simplicity in maintenance, they often lack the agility, scalability, and rapid innovation potential found in distributed environments. This can hinder a business’s ability to adapt to new market trends, open new revenue streams, and quickly respond to customer demands.
Lack of Elasticity
Modern monoliths might scale adequately, but many existing e-commerce monoliths are built on pre-cloud architectures and scale linearly with hardware. Legacy platforms struggle to meet the demands of modern e-commerce, particularly during peak periods. Monolithic architectures, being inelastic and hard to scale, often face infrastructure issues during high-volume events such as promotions and holiday sales. Heavy traffic during these periods can overwhelm an inelastic monolith, causing delays, bounces, and server crashes, which lead to significant revenue loss.
Complications of Customisations
Monolithic platforms, with their tightly coupled front-end and back-end systems, pose challenges for customisations. Developers need to alter both the underlying database code and the front-end platform to implement personalisations, a process that is time-intensive and complicates the system over time, especially as business capabilities grow and different development teams work on the system. Additionally, this high dependency creates a fragile system where a failure in one component can bring down the entire platform.
Slow Response to Market Trends
Customers expect increasingly sophisticated e-commerce experiences. Brands need to be nimble to implement changes quickly and meet new trends and expectations. However, the slower, more complicated update process of a monolithic platform can impede the DevOps cycle, making it harder for brands to execute swift updates.
Changing or Updating Functionality
Implementing and deploying new features or updates in monolithic architectures is often time-consuming and complex. The tight coupling of components makes it difficult to modify or update specific functionalities without impacting the entire system. This “black box” nature necessitates major investments of time and resources for even simple changes. Extensive testing and coordination across development teams are required for modifications, slowing down the time-to-market and hindering a business’s ability to respond to market trends or competitive challenges. Moreover, critical issues within a monolithic architecture can impact the entire system, leading to downtime and revenue loss.
Extensive Testing Requirements
Updates in monolithic architectures require thorough testing to ensure system stability. This necessity for careful testing demands more manpower and time, adding to the complexity and slowing down the deployment process.
In conclusion, while monolithic architectures may appear simpler initially, the challenges they present in scalability, innovation, and maintenance can significantly hinder e-commerce growth and agility. Transitioning to more flexible, modular architectures could better support the evolving demands of modern e-commerce.
What is a Microservice E-commerce?
Microservices architecture is a method of software system development where different single-function applications are coupled together, much like LEGO bricks. Unlike a monolith, a microservices-based architecture employs independent e-commerce applications to handle each unique business function. These microservices communicate through e-commerce APIs, supporting a flexible and scalable e-commerce framework.
In a microservices setup, there is no single codebase or database to manage. Each microservice operates as its own application, complete with its own database. This approach allows brands to change, modify, and scale each microservice independently without affecting the overall architecture. This flexibility enables businesses to adapt quickly to new requirements, innovations, and customer demands, ensuring they can remain competitive and responsive in a fast-paced market.
The Benefits of Microservices
Microservices architecture provides several key benefits that can enhance your e-commerce platform’s performance and responsiveness.
Scalability and Flexibility
One of the main advantages of microservices is the ability to scale individual services independently. If one part of your application experiences a spike in demand, you can scale that specific service without needing to overhaul the entire system. This flexibility ensures that your e-commerce platform can handle increased traffic and customer interactions seamlessly.
Customisation and Personalisation
Microservices allow for increased customisation. Because each service operates independently, you can tweak and personalise different aspects of your platform without affecting the overall system. This means you can quickly adapt to market changes and customer preferences.
Faster Development and Deployment
Thanks to a decentralised development process, microservices enable quicker development and deployment. Different teams can work on various services simultaneously, speeding up the overall project timeline. This agility is crucial in today’s fast-paced e-commerce landscape.
Challenges of Switching to Microservices
However, it’s not all smooth sailing. Transitioning to microservices comes with its own set of challenges.
- Organisational Changes
Switching to a microservice architecture requires managing cross-functional, vertical teams. These teams need to collaborate effectively to develop and maintain the different microservices. This often results in significant organisational changes, which can be difficult for businesses to handle independently.
- Infrastructure Changes
Moving to a microservice system also means updating your infrastructure. You’ll need new tools to monitor the different services, conduct troubleshooting, and eliminate bugs. This shift can be resource-intensive and may require additional training for your IT team.
Real-Life Applications
At Langia IT Solutions, we have extensive experience transforming monolithic webshops running on Hybris into lean, microservice-oriented versions with SAP Commerce Cloud. We support custom microservices or even host SAP Commerce on custom infrastructures like AWS or Azure. Using technologies like Play and Springboot, we’ve helped numerous clients achieve greater scalability and flexibility.
Is It Time to Make the Switch?
Choosing between monolithic and microservice e-commerce platforms depends on your business needs. Monolithic systems might still be suitable for smaller businesses or those with simpler requirements. However, if you’re aiming for high scalability, flexibility, and quicker adaptation to market changes, microservices could be the way forward.
Every business is unique, and consequently, there is no one-size-fits-all commerce platform architecture that perfectly meets every organisation’s distinct needs and requirements. Contact Langia today for a free consultation.
FAQ
What is a monolithic e-commerce platform?
A monolithic e-commerce platform is an all-in-one system where all components are interconnected and managed centrally. This setup can be simpler to implement but can struggle with scalability and flexibility.
What are microservices?
Microservices are a software development approach where single-function applications work together as a system. Each service can be developed, deployed, and scaled independently, offering greater flexibility and resilience.
What are the main benefits of microservices?
The main benefits of microservices include independent scalability, increased customisation and personalisation, and faster development and deployment times.
Are there any challenges with microservices?
Yes, transitioning to microservices can require significant organisational and infrastructure changes. It involves managing cross-functional teams and updating monitoring and troubleshooting tools.
How can Langia IT Solutions help with the transition?
Langia IT Solutions has extensive experience transforming monolithic systems into microservice-oriented platforms. We can help streamline the transition, offering custom solutions and support for various infrastructures. Contact us to learn more!
