6 ms·

Discord: A case study in performance optimization

75 points by tylerdane 8mo ago

alterom 8mo ago
[flagged]
jimmiles 8mo ago
Couldn't they focus some of their creativity on making the UI look less like the inside of a middle schooler's brain?
- ronsor 8mo ago
  Why would they make their UI less familiar to their target audience?
  - esafak 8mo ago
    The problem is that a lot of people who are not part of that target audience have to suffer that UI to get work done.
    - esseph 8mo ago
      > suffer Really? :/
      - deleted 8mo ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 8mo ago
        [deleted]
    - anon7000 8mo ago
      Discord is honestly not great for work, but there are lots of other tools. I think they should focus on what’s made them successful, which is gamers and communities.
      - iwontberude 8mo ago
        They should realize charging people $100/year per person for Nitro and $500/year for server boosts means that they don’t want to be advertised to and have their data stolen.
    - saagarjha 8mo ago
      You’re choosing the gaming chat for your work though
      - Filligree 8mo ago
        It's the one that works.
      - esafak 8mo ago
        I am not; I did not create the communities I am a member of. Dozens of them; none about gaming.
- ipdashc 8mo ago
  In what ways does it look that way, if you recall? I hear this semi-often, but I don't really get it. The base UI of Discord is pretty normal / looks just like every other chat app out there. Is it the ads for nitro and stuff like that were the issue?
  - ronsor 8mo ago
    I think the base UI of Discord is fine, but having used it for almost a decade at this point, the UI has gotten worse. Besides the ads you've mentioned, they've added a lot more clutter (random icons, rarely used features, hidden menus, etc.). When I look at screenshots from 2019, I weep.
    - ipdashc 8mo ago
      There's a bit of clutter for sure, but I don't find it too objectionable. As the sibling comment mentioned, the super reacts are really annoying, and so are the ads, but it's overall alright.
      - everforward 8mo ago
        Most of the clutter I would complain about comes more down to Discord making it really easy to bloat a server (and a cultural expectation to do so). I’m in more than one Discord that has more channels than routine users. Like there are 4 people that use it on at least a weekly basis but there’s a meme channel, a pet photos channel, a news channel, yada yada. Managing notifications is a lost cause because the server owner redecorates the server every other week into new channels and what not. Profiles have gotten weirdly wild, to sell Nitro stuff. Statuses, emojis for the status, now flairs from a server, profile pictures, etc. Constant notifications for junk. Nitro is on sale, some game I don’t play has a quest, etc. It’s fine, but it feels like Discord wants to be more than a carrier for voice and chat and I really just want them to do that. I don’t need “Facebook with VoIP”
        ipdashc 8mo ago
        > I’m in more than one Discord that has more channels than routine users. Likewise, and I find it quite annoying too, but I don't think it's really Discord's fault. They default to one text and one voice channel, after all. The ability to add new channels easily is a good thing, but people do go a bit crazy with it. > Statuses, emojis for the status, now flairs from a server, profile pictures, etc. The server flairs are kind of odd, but aren't the rest of those pretty bog- standard features for a messaging app? I do agree the notifications are annoying, though. At the same time I get it, they do need to make money somehow.
- sourcegrift 8mo ago
  Except they, or more precisely speaking -- RGB keyboard/computer case buyers-- are their target audience, low IQ high spenders
nmilo 8mo ago
I find it funny that backend devs will do all this infrastructure work to support billions of real time messages and then frontend devs stomp all over it by making the app take 500MB of RAM and hundreds of ms to take basic actions.
- ronsor 8mo ago
  One runs on machines we pay for (= costs us money). Another runs on end users' machines (= costs them money).
  - alecco 8mo ago
    But it affects user experience.
    - devmor 8mo ago
      As long as negative experience doesn’t meaningfully impact user monetization, there’s no business incentive for that type of company to care.
    - anon7000 8mo ago
      Backend performance issues can grind your system to a halt. It’s basically a requirement for Discord to work reliably. Front-end performance is not a hard requirement for most end users, unless the app is actually unusable. Discord isn’t that bad compared to some software I’ve used. You have to get beach balls on startup and complete UI freezes for people to really care. If it’s good enough for most people, shaving some MB off the memory usage or small number of ms off latency isn’t important to the business
  - bloomca 8mo ago
    You can pay to have better/more machines, while you can't do the same with your clients
    - estimator7292 8mo ago
      But you can tell users their hardware isn't supported and to fuck off until they buy new hardware. Which is the norm.
egedev 8mo ago
[dead]
saagarjha 8mo ago
Honest question, does anyone appreciate these “case studies”? It seems like they’re always based on some random quote and they go way in detail on what the various technologies are and how they might possibly apply to the subject in question, but with almost no real insight besides “I think this is how it might work”. What kind of case study is that?! If you don’t have real examples how is this better than just presenting the original source for the quote and Wikipedia links to the various technical terms?
- alterom 8mo ago
  >Honest question, does anyone appreciate these “case studies”? I, for one, do not. But great that we get into some guy's ideation about how Discord is possibly cool, while it's undergoing a major scandal related to ties to Peter Thiel's surveillance company, Palantir, in the botched rollout of age verification[1]. My personal guess is that appearance of articles that paint Discord in a positive light on this forum (and lack substance otherwise) is simply PR. [1] https://kotaku.com/discord-palantir-peter-thiel-persona-age-verification-2000668951 https://kotaku.com/discord-palantir-peter-thiel-persona-age-...
  - saagarjha 8mo ago
    I don't really think your comment is very relevant either, fwiw.
    - hackable_sand 8mo ago
      Their comment is supremely relevant. The timing is not a coincidence and it tastes awful
      - saagarjha 8mo ago
        You think this post was written because of the Discord stuff in the news?
        8mo ago
jhgg 8mo ago
Cool article :)
groundzeros2015 8mo ago
Whenever I read about these web startup architectures I notice there is never a baseline comparison. They start with an insane architecture and then do heroics to transform it into something a little better. If you have a fast cgi service inserting a text message into a Postgres database, how many messages do you need until that doesn’t work?
hackable_sand 8mo ago
Don't let them fool you Discord, especially the mobile app, is some of the shittiest, broken software I have encountered. The core protection team is absolute trash at their job

75 points by tylerdane 8mo ago

alterom 8mo ago

[flagged]

jimmiles 8mo ago

Couldn't they focus some of their creativity on making the UI look less like the inside of a middle schooler's brain?

ronsor 8mo ago
Why would they make their UI less familiar to their target audience?
- esafak 8mo ago
  The problem is that a lot of people who are not part of that target audience have to suffer that UI to get work done.
  - esseph 8mo ago
    > suffer Really? :/
    - deleted 8mo ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 8mo ago
      [deleted]
  - anon7000 8mo ago
    Discord is honestly not great for work, but there are lots of other tools. I think they should focus on what’s made them successful, which is gamers and communities.
    - iwontberude 8mo ago
      They should realize charging people $100/year per person for Nitro and $500/year for server boosts means that they don’t want to be advertised to and have their data stolen.
  - saagarjha 8mo ago
    You’re choosing the gaming chat for your work though
    - Filligree 8mo ago
      It's the one that works.
    - esafak 8mo ago
      I am not; I did not create the communities I am a member of. Dozens of them; none about gaming.
ipdashc 8mo ago
In what ways does it look that way, if you recall? I hear this semi-often, but I don't really get it. The base UI of Discord is pretty normal / looks just like every other chat app out there. Is it the ads for nitro and stuff like that were the issue?
- ronsor 8mo ago
  I think the base UI of Discord is fine, but having used it for almost a decade at this point, the UI has gotten worse. Besides the ads you've mentioned, they've added a lot more clutter (random icons, rarely used features, hidden menus, etc.). When I look at screenshots from 2019, I weep.
  - ipdashc 8mo ago
    There's a bit of clutter for sure, but I don't find it too objectionable. As the sibling comment mentioned, the super reacts are really annoying, and so are the ads, but it's overall alright.
    - everforward 8mo ago
      Most of the clutter I would complain about comes more down to Discord making it really easy to bloat a server (and a cultural expectation to do so). I’m in more than one Discord that has more channels than routine users. Like there are 4 people that use it on at least a weekly basis but there’s a meme channel, a pet photos channel, a news channel, yada yada. Managing notifications is a lost cause because the server owner redecorates the server every other week into new channels and what not. Profiles have gotten weirdly wild, to sell Nitro stuff. Statuses, emojis for the status, now flairs from a server, profile pictures, etc. Constant notifications for junk. Nitro is on sale, some game I don’t play has a quest, etc. It’s fine, but it feels like Discord wants to be more than a carrier for voice and chat and I really just want them to do that. I don’t need “Facebook with VoIP”
      - ipdashc 8mo ago
        > I’m in more than one Discord that has more channels than routine users. Likewise, and I find it quite annoying too, but I don't think it's really Discord's fault. They default to one text and one voice channel, after all. The ability to add new channels easily is a good thing, but people do go a bit crazy with it. > Statuses, emojis for the status, now flairs from a server, profile pictures, etc. The server flairs are kind of odd, but aren't the rest of those pretty bog- standard features for a messaging app? I do agree the notifications are annoying, though. At the same time I get it, they do need to make money somehow.
sourcegrift 8mo ago
Except they, or more precisely speaking -- RGB keyboard/computer case buyers-- are their target audience, low IQ high spenders

nmilo 8mo ago

I find it funny that backend devs will do all this infrastructure work to support billions of real time messages and then frontend devs stomp all over it by making the app take 500MB of RAM and hundreds of ms to take basic actions.

ronsor 8mo ago
One runs on machines we pay for (= costs us money). Another runs on end users' machines (= costs them money).
- alecco 8mo ago
  But it affects user experience.
  - devmor 8mo ago
    As long as negative experience doesn’t meaningfully impact user monetization, there’s no business incentive for that type of company to care.
  - anon7000 8mo ago
    Backend performance issues can grind your system to a halt. It’s basically a requirement for Discord to work reliably. Front-end performance is not a hard requirement for most end users, unless the app is actually unusable. Discord isn’t that bad compared to some software I’ve used. You have to get beach balls on startup and complete UI freezes for people to really care. If it’s good enough for most people, shaving some MB off the memory usage or small number of ms off latency isn’t important to the business
- bloomca 8mo ago
  You can pay to have better/more machines, while you can't do the same with your clients
  - estimator7292 8mo ago
    But you can tell users their hardware isn't supported and to fuck off until they buy new hardware. Which is the norm.

egedev 8mo ago

[dead]

saagarjha 8mo ago

Honest question, does anyone appreciate these “case studies”? It seems like they’re always based on some random quote and they go way in detail on what the various technologies are and how they might possibly apply to the subject in question, but with almost no real insight besides “I think this is how it might work”. What kind of case study is that?! If you don’t have real examples how is this better than just presenting the original source for the quote and Wikipedia links to the various technical terms?

alterom 8mo ago
>Honest question, does anyone appreciate these “case studies”? I, for one, do not. But great that we get into some guy's ideation about how Discord is possibly cool, while it's undergoing a major scandal related to ties to Peter Thiel's surveillance company, Palantir, in the botched rollout of age verification[1]. My personal guess is that appearance of articles that paint Discord in a positive light on this forum (and lack substance otherwise) is simply PR. [1] https://kotaku.com/discord-palantir-peter-thiel-persona-age-verification-2000668951 https://kotaku.com/discord-palantir-peter-thiel-persona-age-...
- saagarjha 8mo ago
  I don't really think your comment is very relevant either, fwiw.
  - hackable_sand 8mo ago
    Their comment is supremely relevant. The timing is not a coincidence and it tastes awful
    - saagarjha 8mo ago
      You think this post was written because of the Discord stuff in the news?
      - 8mo ago

jhgg 8mo ago

Cool article :)

groundzeros2015 8mo ago

Whenever I read about these web startup architectures I notice there is never a baseline comparison. They start with an insane architecture and then do heroics to transform it into something a little better. If you have a fast cgi service inserting a text message into a Postgres database, how many messages do you need until that doesn’t work?

hackable_sand 8mo ago

Don't let them fool you Discord, especially the mobile app, is some of the shittiest, broken software I have encountered. The core protection team is absolute trash at their job