01、What is Serverless
Serverless is a cloud computing architecture model whose core concept is to shift the task of building, running and managing applications to the cloud service provider, so that developers can focus on writing business logic without caring about the maintenance of the underlying infrastructure.
This means that developers no longer need to purchase and manage servers upfront, but only need to dynamically allocate and use resources as necessary. serverless also supports per-flow billing, as developers only need to pay for the actual use of resources, and do not need to purchase and configure infrastructure such as servers upfront.
Serverless Computing
Serverless is also known as "serverless computing" because developers do not have to think about how servers are implemented and managed. In a Serverless architecture, the cloud service provider automatically allocates the resources required by the developer, such as compute, storage, and network resources. The developer only needs to upload the application code, specify the required resources and configuration information, and deploy the application to the cloud.
Architecture Decoupling
The Serverless architecture also has the advantage of decoupling, which allows applications to be split into multiple independent functions that can be deployed, managed and tested independently. This splitting improves the reliability and scalability of the application and reduces dependencies between applications, thereby simplifying the overall application development and maintenance process.
Elastic Scaling
The Serverless architecture also supports automatic elastic scaling, where the cloud provider automatically allocates more resources to handle requests as the volume of requests for the application increases. This automatic scaling improves the availability and reliability of applications while reducing the cost of running them.
02. Challenges of Serverless
Cold Start
Functions in the Serverless architecture are created and destroyed on demand, so when a function is not used for a long time, its state may be cleared and need to be recreated the next time it is used. This process of re-creation is called "cold start" and it may lead to increased latency in the application and affect the performance of the application.
Program Limitations
In Serverless architectures, functions have fixed execution times and memory limits, which can limit the functionality and performance of an application. For example, certain applications need to run long tasks or tasks that require a lot of memory, and these tasks may not be able to be executed under the Serverless architecture.
Dependency Management
Functions in Serverless architectures are usually independent, which means they need to manage the dependencies they need themselves. This may lead to some problems, such as version conflicts and security issues of dependencies.
03、Serverless application scenarios
Web applications
Serverless architecture can be used to build Web applications that can dynamically allocate and use compute and storage resources to improve the availability and performance of Web applications and reduce costs.
Back-end processing
Serverless architectures can be used for back-end processing tasks such as data processing, image processing, file conversion, and more. These tasks often require large amounts of compute resources, and Serverless architectures can provide fast, scalable solutions and reduce costs.
Event-Driven Applications
Serverless architecture is also suitable for event-driven applications, such as processing real-time data streams, calling third-party APIs, and so on. These applications need to respond quickly to events, and Serverless architecture can provide a fast, reliable solution and reduce costs.
04、Popular Serverless Frameworks
AWS Lambda
AWS Lambda is Amazon Web Services' Serverless computing platform, which supports multiple languages and frameworks and provides rich tools and services such as API gateways, message queues, etc.
Azure Functions
Azure Functions is Microsoft's Serverless computing platform that supports multiple languages and frameworks and provides integration with Azure cloud services, such as storage, databases, and more.
Google Cloud Functions
Google Cloud Functions is Google Cloud Platform's Serverless computing platform, which supports multiple languages and frameworks and provides features for integration with Google Cloud Services, such as data analytics, machine learning, etc.
OpenFaaS
OpenFaaS is an open source Serverless framework that supports multiple programming languages and container technologies and provides an easy-to-use web interface for managing functions and deploying applications. openFaaS can also be integrated with popular container orchestration tools such as Docker and Kubernetes to provide more flexible and powerful functionality.
Knative
Knative is an open source Serverless framework developed by Google, Pivotal and other partners. It is built on Kubernetes and offers many advanced features such as auto-scaling, auto-deployment, stateless services, event-driven, etc. Knative can run on any cloud platform that supports Kubernetes, including Google Cloud, AWS, Azure, etc.