I like them boring: php mvc backend with an sql database like MySQL. HAProxy does TLS termination and failover/loadbalancing. Varnish does response caching/esi

I like them boring: php mvc backend with an sql database like MySQL. HAProxy does TLS termination and failover/loadbalancing. Varnish does response caching/esi processing. Responses are rendered according to accept header in the request, so the "api" is also the web application (with a different view renderer basically). For the web view, traditional links/forms as much as possible. Those things can always be upgraded to do XHR loads as a progressive enhancement. I'm sure none of these concepts are popular with the HN crowd.