Tag: Micro-Service

Our problem with micro-services using AWS ECS

We are into a startup and as a trending technology our predecessors used micro-services for our new website.

It is a good move if we see the benefits of micro-services like

  • scaling a website gets much easier
  • loosely coupled
  • easy for developing
  • deployment can focus on each service
  • can be used different technologies for each service
  • testing can be concentrated on one service

Here we are considered the problems we may face in future and developed the application thinking about the benefits of micro-services.

Point to be noted: We also have to think about – does these problems will be a big issue for us compared to the disadvantages of the micro-services?

NOTE: Our Website is a less traffic website and we are getting our clients one by one. It is not a heavily used website. Keep this in mind while reading this article.

We faced issues following issues with micro-services:

  • Complexity – more complex for deployment and maintenance
  • Cost – AWS ECS costs more for all the micro-service hosting for a less traffic website
  • Even though these are micro-services it has some dependency between them that we cannot avoid. Be ready to deal with this.
  • Sometimes one service (AWS Container) goes offline and starting over! So we get the No Service issue in the website.
  • Very difficult to go back to monolith application even clubbing 3-4 services together, as they use different software or software versions.

So be careful if you are planning to use micro-service architecture for a less used website or as a starting of your business. Take your time and think if micro-service architecture suits your business and your current situation.

The fact: It should not take that much cost for a website which has less traffic. Be ready to pay minimum amount for hosting with micro-services.

Set up:

  • Used AWS ECS (ec2 launch type) with services and task definitions defined
  • 11 Micro-services, 11 containers are spinning
  • Cost: Rs.12k ($160) per month

Workaround:

  • Consider using AWS Fargate type but not sure these issues get resolved
  • Deploy all the services in one EC2 Instance without using ECS
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