Building Scalable Web Sites

What Hacker News says

1. mmaiaMar 2026
   On the backend side, Cal Henderson published the details of Flickr's architecture in "Building Scalable Web Sites". It was a reference at the time, the "Designing Data-Intensive Applications" of another generation.
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2. tjadowskiDec 2018
   Hi,

   I have a close friend who started to learn programming. He want to be a backend web developer. It’s a great book about building scalable websites https://www.amazon.com/Building-Scalable-Web-Sites-Applications/dp/0596102356 but it was written in 2005 and now we have clouds and containers.

   So, a question is. Is there a modern version of this book or on this topic? Could you recommend any title?

   Thanks a lot for any tips ;-)

   Tom

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3. kellanemAug 2012
   Slightly dated, but I recommend Cal's book on the lessons we learned scaling Flickr, http://www.amazon.com/Building-Scalable-Web-Sites-Applicatio...

   Also remember that premature scaling is one of the leading causes of failure.

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4. aespinozaJan 2012
   I recommend these two books:

   - Scalability Rules: 50 Principles for Scaling Web Sites by Martin L. Abbott & Michael T. Fisher

   - Building Scalable Web Sites: Building, Scaling, and Optimizing the Next Generation of Web Applications [Paperback] by Cal Henderson

   I think they are the best resources I have found about the topic. If you are using .Net, like me this is book has good tips as well:

   - Ultra-Fast ASP.NET: Build Ultra-Fast and Ultra-Scalable web sites using ASP.NET and SQL Server by Richard Kiessig

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5. simonwFeb 2011
   I'm a big fan of Building Scalable Web Sites - it's a bit old now (it predates cloud-computing-for-everything) but still very relevant if you're just starting to learn about this stuff. It's basically everything the author learned scaling Flickr from a tiny site to several hundred million photos.
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6. blurryDec 2010
   If scalability is relevant to your product, this is an accessible classic:

   http://www.amazon.com/Building-Scalable-Web-Sites-Applicatio...

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