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(Timescale co-founder) I also used to hate the phrase. But now I get it. And it's not about marketing, but about the idea that the developers _doesn't shouldn'
by akulkarni 5y ago
(Timescale co-founder)
I also used to hate the phrase. But now I get it. And it's not about marketing, but about the idea that the developers _doesn't shouldn't have to worry about the server_.
For example, when you run a DB on a classic DBaaS, you have to worry about CPU, memory, storage provisioning. But when you use a classic SaaS service (e.g., Stripe, Twilio), you don't think about servers at all - but rather just how much you are consuming.
The Serverless model for databases is aiming to apply a SaaS like experience but for DBaaS. Where you don't need to think about provisioning, but about consumption.
What we (try to) do in this article is to push beyond that serverless paradigm. We believe there are real drawbacks to the "serverless black box" architecture that the industry is building, and what (we believe) developers need (including ourselves) is a more a "transparent box."
Hope this helps. But "serverless" also feels a little like "horseless carriages". I suspect in 5 years we'll have a better term that describes this concept for what it _is_, not what it _isn't_.
- Scarbutt 5y agoWith timescale you still have to deal and think about database connections, nodes and what not. IMO, a truly serverless database is something like dynamodb which just gives you an HTTP endpoint and they take care of the rest.
- avthar 5y agoThe point of the blog post is that Timescale cloud isn't totally "serverless", because for some 20% of use cases, you do want to think about nodes and other database internals. From the blog post: "So today’s serverless data platforms are not familiar or flexible. But further, black boxes are never truly easy and worry free: you never know if there are any skeletons lurking in the proverbial closet, just waiting to cause your service to fall over." (Timescale employee here)
- tofuahdude 5y agoFWIW you guys are losing me in your sales pitch here. I am looking for technical products and I interpret "serverless" as marketing garbage, not as "I dont have to worry about the server". Call it managed DB as a service and you're more honest in your product offering. You're suffering marketing-speak in lieu of honesty for a technical product - bad plan, imo.
- bpodgursky 5y agoI am an engineer and to me "serverless" means I don't pay money when I'm not using it. Which I like.
- zinclozenge 5y agoI made another comment to this point, but I think you described it much more succinctly.
- errwhat 5y agoI think you still pay with Timescale both in terms of committed capacity, and when you pause it, although the pitch and docs are all over the shop at the moment.
- wikibob 5y agoI think calling it serverless perfectly captures the operational semantics. Your target market will understand. Ignore the HackerNews naysayers who are stuck in the past.