Distributed-Systems

Two CouchDB databases got the same replications in the same order. One ended with a document deleted, the other with it live, and the only difference was a validation function that accepts everything. This is the full path from a theory of convergence, to a model of CouchDB’s replication, to a prediction committed before any test, to the one scenario the model got wrong, to the bug behind it and the fix that merged into CouchDB.

Agents that share state usually rely on eventual consistency and hope. Bide’s shared state rests on a convergence theorem that is machine-checked axiom-free, re-checked on three proof-assistant toolchains, and wired into the engine as a fail-closed gate, so a bug in the Go verifier cannot hand you a machine whose tables do not converge. This is what is proven, how it is checked, and exactly where the proof stops.

Everyone thinks they know JSON. But do you know why it was created, what problems it solved, and more importantly - what problems it created? Part 1 explores JSON’s origins, its triumph over XML, and the fundamental weaknesses that spawned an entire ecosystem of extensions.

REST is great for resources, but what about actions? JSON-RPC provides a simple, transport-agnostic protocol for calling remote functions. Learn the spec, implementation patterns, and why major projects like Ethereum and VS Code chose JSON-RPC over REST.

Master API communication patterns: REST, GraphQL, WebSocket, gRPC, webhooks, message queues, and more. Complete guide with diagrams, code examples, and decision frameworks for choosing the right pattern.

Protocol Buffers (protobuf) is Google’s binary serialization format - smaller, faster, and type-safe compared to JSON. Learn what protobuf is, how it works, and when to use it for APIs and microservices.