Problems / Async and streaming, hard

Events that never arrive

The API writes the order to the database, then publishes an event. At 10 s the queue is unavailable for 5 seconds: orders are saved but their events vanish.

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Your goals

No lost events, success ≥ 99%.

The traffic

600 requests a second for 30 seconds: 100% submit (writes).

The system

What each component does in this design, and what calls it. The simulator mimics each one from these settings.

ComponentIts job hereSettings
Load balancerLoad balancerTraffic enters here.Calls API.Layer 4 balancers route by IP and port; layer 7 balancers read HTTP and can route by path or header.–
APIApp serviceLoad balancer forwards to it.Calls Orders DB, Job queue (SQS) (publishes).Little's law: throughput ≈ concurrency ÷ latency. 200 slots at 50 ms serve about 4,000 req/s.3 replicas × 200 slots · timeout 1.0 s
Orders DBSQL databaseAPI calls it.Postgres runs one process per connection, which is why poolers like PgBouncer sit in front of busy databases.8 vCPU · 60 connections
Job queue (SQS)Message queueAPI publishes to it.Calls Workers.If a consumer does not finish within the visibility timeout, the message is delivered again.–
WorkersWorkerJob queue (SQS) consumes from it.Calls Results DB.Queues deliver at least once, so a worker can see the same message twice.16 concurrent jobs
Results DBSQL databaseWorkers calls it.Postgres runs one process per connection, which is why poolers like PgBouncer sit in front of busy databases.8 vCPU · 60 connections

Hints

Try it first. Open one hint at a time if you get stuck.

Hint 1

Two writes, no transaction across them.

Hint 2

Write the event in the same transaction as the order.

One way to solve it

Use a transactional outbox.

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