> the stack always grows to the point that a dev can no longer test it on their own machine Sounds like you have a different problem. CPU resources required t

> the stack always grows to the point that a dev can no longer test it on their own machine Sounds like you have a different problem. CPU resources required to run your stack should be very minimal if it's a single user accessing it for local testing idle threads don't consume oodles of cpu cycles to do nothing. Memory use may be significant even in that case (depending on your stack) but let's be realistic. If your stack is so large that it alone requires more memory than a dev machine can spare with an IDE open, the cost of providing developers with capable workstations will pale in comparison to the cost of running the prod environment. I have a client whose prod environment is 2x load balancer; 2x app server; 3x DB cluster node - all rented virtual machines. We just upgraded to higher spec machines to give headroom over the next couple of years (ie most machines doubled the RAM from the previous generation). My old workstation bought in 2018 had enough memory that it could virtualise the current prod environment with the same amounts of RAM as prod, and still have 20GB free. My current workstation would have 80+ GB free. In 95% of cases if you can't run the stack for a single user testing it, on a single physical machine, you're doing something drastically wrong somewhere.