How got get your app under control? Remove wildgrow, KISS, monolithize
A lot of startups run out of money and can't take off because they have a very clumsy/heavy codebase that's hard to change/maintain. In early stage startups, it is very easy to build up unmaintainable and legacy code because you pivot a lot, both in tech-stack, developers, and in features of your app. Because of those reasons, app development will slow down a lot and become very complex.
Complex Development Ecosystems What I often see is that startups are using many different programming languages and tools in their ecosystem. There is always a different programming language that's better in some ways, but often, the most important factor is overseen: learnability.
If you use Python, Ruby on Rails and Node on your backend, every developer needs to learn those languages. If you use React Native, Redux, and Vue JS on your front-ends, you give your developers 3x more to learn before they can become productive. Oh hey, let's throw PHP in the mix! As an early stage startup, it may easily become impossible to aquire people that know it all, and even if they find someone, knowing all those languages won't make you the quickest at all of them. Therefore, it may be an idea to decrease learning curve of your development ecosystem.
I identified 3 reasons why startup development ecosystems can quickly become slow, unmaintainable and clumsy:
- Changing developers
- Changing tech stacks
- Changing feature demands
What I advise and pursue in the apps I build, is the following stack and paradigms:
- GitHub for planning (issues) and version control. Don't use GitLab to reduce maintenance. It's worth the price
- JS Only: Use React, React Native and Node JS. The developer now just has to learn one language! This also encourages feature-ownership
- Keep DB Simple: As database, use SQLite until you require more power (which is very late, much later than most developers think)
- Vertical Scaling: Vertical scaling to the max. Much simpler DevOps, can be done until quite big apps generate huge amounts of revenue.
- Move to a single codebase: Easier setup. Don't split your issues between repo's.
- Create an overview: Create and maintain a README file that gets new developers up to speed and gives an overview for current developers and other employees of the startup.
- Microservices are often considered, but for most startups, it's overkill
- Start using docker and kubernetes once you really need it. Your setup changes too quickly in the beginning, and it will just increase maintenance cost.
- Use Expo as much as possible
- Think well about your code quality
Migrate to Expo I see a lot of startups working on big apps in either native Android, native iOS (or both), or in bare React Native. Expo has matured in the past few years, and for most apps, it will work, making some small concessions. There is a big edge using expo as a startup: I call it the Expo Edge. At a few companies I've worked, I think that a full rewrite of your app may not be a bad idea at all https://medium.com/@herbcaudill/lessons-from-6-software-rewrite-stories-635e4c8f7c22 . For bigger apps, it can be daunting and scary and it's often discouraged, but especiallly for early stage startups that need to pivot a few times, it can be good to rewrite if you have learned more about your tech-stack, and the features you really need. If it's possible, I recommend migrating to Expo. Expo takes away much of the hassle of app development (Deployment, OTA, Unstable code) and makes it possible for you to focus on what matters: The features of your app.
About Monolithizing Micro Services are something you grow into, not begin with https://nickjanetakis.com/blog/microservices-are-something-you-grow-into-not-begin-with . In this article, I found a very interesting quote: "As developers we’ve all heard the phrase “DRY: don’t repeat yourself” and in general that’s a reasonable guide to go by, but often times it’s very well worth repeating yourself. It’s worth repeating yourself because if you try to abstract something without really understanding what you’re abstracting then you create something called a leaky abstraction https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/11/11/the-law-of-leaky-abstractions/." Also, he states Shopify and Basecamp are monoliths and they earn $20M+/month.
Some people area against monoliths, but they have a good reason; How MicroServices saved my small SaaS business https://www.ynonperek.com/2018/01/15/microservices/ states micro services are useful because it takes other programmers (freelancers) months to work comfortably with his codebase. If you have many individual teams or freelancers at work at your project, it can be better to let them build microservices since those will be easier to understand on themselves for other freelancers. However, I still think that a one-language paradigm is even better (JS-only, for example).
All in all I think that, for most startups, it'll be better to keep a monolith or to monolithize if you have different services already.