Programmers often make the fallacy of assuming that only the asymptotic case should be considered (just look at Big-O notation). But when it comes to specialize

Programmers often make the fallacy of assuming that only the asymptotic case should be considered (just look at Big-O notation). But when it comes to specialized tools and frameworks, unlike sorting algorithms, many use-cases never break past the scale where the asymptote is the primary thing driving the curve. With that in mind, it's my experience that every tool or framework has a different window of scale in which it's ideal, which has both lower and upper bounds, and one simply needs to find one's own project along that axis when choosing a technology. Hadoop may be the best solution as N approaches infinity - and we as programmers love thinking in terms of infinity - but it may not start being the best solution until 10x your actual range for N.