The Monolithic Choice in a Modern World
When revamping the Clozit e-commerce platform, one of the most important decisions I made was the architectural approach. While microservices are often hailed as the modern standard for scalable applications, for a project of this scale and for my development style, a monolithic architecture offered significant advantages. In a monolith, the entire codebase—frontend, backend, and business logic—resides in a single repository. This simplifies the development and deployment process immensely, as there's no need to manage multiple repositories, services, and complex communication protocols. For a small team or a single developer, this can lead to much faster iteration and less overhead. It also allows for a high degree of code sharing, which results in a more cohesive and consistent application.
The Next.js Hybrid Monolith: A Modern Approach
My approach to the Clozit V2 monolith is a hybrid one, leveraging the unique capabilities of Next.js. Next.js allows me to build a truly full-stack application within a single project, blurring the traditional lines between the frontend and backend.
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Full-Stack Main App: The main e-commerce application is a full-stack Next.js project. It makes extensive use of Server Components for data fetching and rendering. This means that a lot of the logic that would traditionally be handled on a separate backend server is now handled directly within the component tree, making the application performant and efficient. For backend operations that require user interaction, like adding items to a cart or submitting a form, I'm using Server Actions. This allows me to handle server-side logic directly from my React components, eliminating the need for separate API routes for internal communication. This direct interaction between the frontend and the backend within the same project simplifies the codebase and streamlines the development process.
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API Routes for External Services: While Server Actions handle the internal logic, I've designated a set of API routes specifically for external communication. This includes interactions with third-party services like Stripe for payment processing and an authentication library for user management. This separation keeps sensitive API keys and complex third-party logic isolated and secure. It’s a clean and modular way to handle external dependencies.
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Dashboard as a Separate Frontend: The Clozit V2 project also includes a separate React application for the administrative dashboard. This frontend makes requests to a dedicated set of API routes within the same Next.js project. This setup allows for a clear separation of concerns, providing a custom, feature-rich dashboard without cluttering the main application's codebase.
This architecture provides the best of both worlds: the simplicity of a monolith with the flexibility and power of modern, decoupled frontends and a well-structured backend. It's a testament to how a single framework like Next.js can be a powerful tool for building complex, hybrid applications that are both performant and easy to maintain.