{"id":24,"date":"2024-02-13T13:52:13","date_gmt":"2024-02-13T10:52:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/caitiem.com\/?p=24"},"modified":"2024-02-13T15:29:07","modified_gmt":"2024-02-13T12:29:07","slug":"resources-for-getting-started-with-distributed-systems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.caitiem.com\/2017\/09\/07\/getting-started-with-distributed-systems\/","title":{"rendered":"Resources for Getting Started with Distributed\u00a0Systems"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>I\u2019m often asked how to get started with Distributed Systems, so this post documents my path and some of the resources I found most helpful. &nbsp;It is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is worth noting that I am not classically trained in Distributed Systems. &nbsp;I am mostly self taught via independent study and on the job experience. &nbsp;I do have a B.S. in Computer Science from Cornell, but focused mostly on graphics and security in my specialization classes. &nbsp;My love of Distributed Systems and education in it came once I entered industry. &nbsp;The moral of this story is that understanding distributed systems doesn\u2019t require academic intervention to learn and excel at.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Books on Theory &amp; Background<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Introduction to Reliable and Secure Distributed Programming: This book is an excellent introduction to the fundamentals of distributed computing. \u00a0It definitely takes an academic approach. \u00a0But is a good place to start to understand the terminology and challenges in the field.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Replication: Theory and Practice: This book is a summary of 30 years of distributed systems research on replication up to 2007. \u00a0Its a great starter and contains all the references to the original work. \u00a0Each chapter is incredibly dense, and led me down multiple paper rabbit holes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Papers<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>This is by no means an exhaustive list, but these papers I keep coming back to, and they have significantly shaped the way I think about Distributed Systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Time, Clocks, and the Ordering of Events in Distributed Systems<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Impossibility of Distributed Consensus with One Faulty Process<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Unreliable Failure Detectors for Reliable Distributed Systems<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>CAP Twelve Years Later: How the Rules Have Changed<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Harvest, Yield and Scalable Tolerant Systems<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Dynamo, Amazon\u2019s Highly Available Key Value Store<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The Chubby Lock Service for Loosely-Coupled Distributed System<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Fallacies of Distributed Computing<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">A Note on Reading Papers<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>A note on reading papers: I start with the Abstract, if I find in interesting I\u2019ll proceed onto the Introduction, then the Conclusion. &nbsp;Only then if I am incredibly interested in the implementation or details will I read the whole thing. &nbsp;Also the References are a gold mine, they cite related and foundational work. &nbsp;Often times reading papers is a recursive process. &nbsp;I\u2019ll start on one then find a concept I\u2019m unfamiliar with or don\u2019t understand, so I\u2019ll read the referenced paper and so on. &nbsp;This often times results in going down the paper rabbit holes, and one time resulted in me reading a dissertation from the 1980s but it is a great way to learn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I also highly recommend Michael Bernstein\u2019s blog post \u201cShould I Read Papers?\u201d for more on the motivations and how to read an academic paper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Blog Posts &amp; Talks<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Below is a list of some of my favorite blog posts and talks that shaped how I think about building Distributed Systems. &nbsp;Most of these are old, but I keep coming back to them, and still find them relevant today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Notes on Distributed Systems for Young Bloods by Jeff Hodges<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Jepsen Blog Posts by Kyle Kingsbury\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Everything Will Flow: Distributed Queues &amp; Backpressure by Zach Tellman<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Bad As I Wanna Be: Coordination and Consistency in Distributed Systems by Peter Bailis<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Learning from Industry<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The art of building, operating, and running distributed systems in industry is orthogonal to the theory of Distributed Systems. &nbsp;I truly believe that the best way to learn about Distributed Systems is to get hands on experience working on one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In addition Post Mortems are another great source of information. \u00a0Large tech companies, like Amazon, Netflix, Google, and Microsoft, often publish a post mortem after a major outage. \u00a0These are usually pretty dry to read, but contain some hard learned lessons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019m often asked how to get started with Distributed Systems, so this post documents my path and some of the resources I found most helpful. &nbsp;It is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list. It is worth noting that I am not classically trained in Distributed Systems. &nbsp;I&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tech-insights"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Resources for Getting Started with Distributed\u00a0Systems - caitiem.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It is worth noting that I am not classically trained in Distributed Systems. \u00a0I am mostly self taught via independent study and on the job experience. \u00a0I do have a B.S. in Computer Science from Cornell, but focused mostly on graphics and security in my specialization classes. \u00a0My love of Distributed Systems and education in it came once I entered industry. \u00a0The moral of this story is that understanding distributed systems doesn\u2019t require academic intervention to learn and excel at.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/www.caitiem.com\/2017\/09\/07\/getting-started-with-distributed-systems\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Resources for Getting Started with Distributed\u00a0Systems - caitiem.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It is worth noting that I am not classically trained in Distributed Systems. \u00a0I am mostly self taught via independent study and on the job experience. \u00a0I do have a B.S. in Computer Science from Cornell, but focused mostly on graphics and security in my specialization classes. \u00a0My love of Distributed Systems and education in it came once I entered industry. \u00a0The moral of this story is that understanding distributed systems doesn\u2019t require academic intervention to learn and excel at.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/www.caitiem.com\/2017\/09\/07\/getting-started-with-distributed-systems\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"caitiem.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-02-13T10:52:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-02-13T12:29:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"caiti335\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"caiti335\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\/\/www.caitiem.com\/2017\/09\/07\/getting-started-with-distributed-systems\/\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.caitiem.com\/2017\/09\/07\/getting-started-with-distributed-systems\/\",\"name\":\"Resources for Getting Started with Distributed\u00a0Systems - 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