How to design scalable applications? [closed]

Answer 1

This is a good intro to the subject: IBM developerWorks had a couple of interesting tutorials about using architecture patterns for applications that scale: here and here.

Answer 2

This is a nice read on livejournal and how they've scaled their application over time.

danga.com/words/2004_mysqlcon/mysql-slides.pdf[PDF]

It might not be the sort of thing you're looking for, but it's one of the better "This is what we did and why" overviews on scaling.

Answer 3

There are already some great answers posted here. In some of the books and links you will find a few common thinking patterns.

• Write as little code as possible

• Reuse code as much as possible

• Don't over, or under abstract your design

• Break things into modular areas that can run on seperate, or multiple systems. Heavy processing should be left to a seperate system.