3factor app - Realtime GraphQL

We begin to twitch as we review the first factor of Hasura’s 3factor app, Realtime GraphQL, while Allen gets distrac … SQUIRREL!, Michael might own some bell bottoms, and Joe is stuck with cobalt.

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3factor app and the First Factor

3factor app

• The 3factor app is a modern architecture for full stack applications, described by the folks at Hasura.
• High feature velocity and scalability from the start:
  • Real time GraphQL
  • Reliable eventing
  • Async serverless
• Kinda boils down to …
  • Have an API gateway (for them, GraphQL).
  • Store state in a (most likely distributed) store.
  • Have services interact with state via an event system.
• Versus how did we used to do things using a REST API for each individual entity.
  • Let’s be honest though. We probably created a single very specialized REST API for a particular page all in the name of performance. But it was only used for that page.
• Related technologies:
  • Web Sockets
  • Serverless
  • Lambda / Kappa – Types Streaming architectures
  • Event based architectures
  • Microservices

Factor 1 – Realtime GraphQL

Use Realtime GraphQL as the Data API Layer

• Must be low-latency.
  • Less than 100 ms is ideal.
• Must support subscriptions.
  • Allows the application to consume information from the GraphQL API in real-time.

Some Comparisons to Typical Backend API Calls

Traditional application	3factor application
Uses REST calls.	Uses GraphQL API.
May require multiple calls to retrieve all data (customer, order, order details) – OR a complex purpose built call that will return all three in one call.	Uses GraphQL query to return data needed in a single call defined by the caller.
Uses something like Swagger to generate API documentation.	GraphQL will auto-generate entire schema and related documents.
For realtime you’ll set up WebSocket based APIs.	Use GraphQL’s native subscriptions.
Continuously poll backend for updates.	Use GraphQL’s event based subscriptions to receive updates.

Major Benefits of GraphQL

• Massively accelerates front-end development speed because developers can get the data they want without any need to build additional APIs.
• GraphQL APIs are strongly typed.
• Don’t need to maintain additional documenting tools. Using a UI like GraphiQL, you can explore data by writing queries with an Intellisense like auto-complete experience.
• Realtime built in natively.
• Prevents over-fetching. Sorta. To the client, yes. Not necessarily so though on the server side.

A Little More About GraphQL

• GraphQL is a Query Lang