Intermediate · Systems

Microservices

Visual diagram · (in preparation) · Math · (in preparation) · Worked example · 3 difficulty levels.

TL;DR. An architectural style where applications are built as small, independently deployable services.

Technical Definition

An architectural style where applications are built as small, independently deployable services.

How it works

ML systems often decompose into ingestion, feature, training, serving, and monitoring services. Microservices enable independent scaling and language choice but add complexity in networking, observability, and data consistency.

Related Concepts

• API — An application programming interface — the contract by which software components communicate.
• Containerization — Packaging an application with all its dependencies so it runs consistently across environments.
• Kubernetes — An open-source platform for orchestrating containerized applications at scale.