Often businesses handle a degree of inconsistency in order to respond quickly to demand

(written by lawrence krubner, however indented passages are often quotes). You can contact lawrence at: lawrence@krubner.com, or follow me on Twitter.

Perfect consistency is too rigid for most businesses, and it is painful when technical teams try to enforce this on a company, out of some ideological commitment to doing things the “correct” computer science way. “Eventual consistency” has been the standard that businesses have striven after since the Arab-Hindu cultures first invented dual-entry accounting, more than 500 years ago, and this is the standard that tech teams should enable for the businesses they serve.

Choosing to manage inconsistencies in this way is a new challenge for many development teams, but it is one that often matches business practice. Often businesses handle a degree of inconsistency in order to respond quickly to demand, while having some kind of reversal process to deal with mistakes. The trade-off is worth it as long as the cost of fixing mistakes is less than the cost of lost business under greater consistency.

Post external references

  1. 1
    http://martinfowler.com/articles/microservices.html
  2. 2
    http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/40697560?uid=3739808&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21103724051297
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