Idempotence: The Property That Makes Distributed Systems Reliable
How a single algebraic property transforms retry logic from gamble to theorem in distributed systems
The CALM Theorem: When Coordination Is Unavoidable
A formal boundary between coordination-free and coordination-required distributed computation, drawn by logic itself
Snapshot Isolation: The Most Misunderstood Consistency Level
Why most 'serializable' databases quietly run snapshot isolation — and what the formal gap actually costs
Primary-Backup Replication: The Simplest Correct Replication Strategy
When environmental guarantees are strong enough, the simplest replication protocol is also the correct one.
Failure Detectors: The Theoretical Tool That Makes Consensus Possible
How Chandra and Toueg's failure detector abstraction reveals exactly what consensus demands from any system
The Log: A Simple Abstraction That Powers Distributed Systems
How a simple append-only sequence enables formal reasoning about the hardest problems in distributed coordination.
Two-Phase Commit: Understanding Distributed Transaction Coordination
Why distributed transactions must sometimes wait, and why no protocol can change that.
Eventual Consistency Is a Spectrum: Understanding Weak Consistency Models
Mapping the precise hierarchy from eventual consistency to linearizability, and why testing cannot prove you got it right.
Serializability vs Linearizability: Two Consistency Models You Must Distinguish
Transactions and real-time ordering are orthogonal guarantees—conflating them produces systems that satisfy neither.
Distributed Snapshots: Capturing Global State Without Stopping the World
How the Chandy-Lamport algorithm captures consistent global state in running distributed systems through elegant marker passing.
Exactly-Once Delivery Is Impossible: What Systems Actually Provide
True exactly-once delivery is mathematically impossible—but exactly-once processing is achievable through careful specification.
Quorum Systems: The Mathematics of Distributed Agreement
How intersection properties turn distributed coordination into mathematical certainty
Chain Replication: Optimal Throughput Through Sequential Processing
How linear replica arrangement achieves optimal read throughput while maintaining provable linearizability guarantees
CAP Theorem Demystified: What It Actually Proves and Where It Misleads
Understanding the precise mathematical boundaries—and practical limitations—of distributed systems' most cited impossibility result
State Machine Replication: The Universal Pattern for Fault-Tolerant Systems
How deterministic computation and consensus protocols combine to create provably correct fault-tolerant distributed systems
Paxos Deconstructed: Understanding the Algorithm That Powers the Internet
From impossibility theorems to inevitable structure—how mathematical constraints uniquely determine the consensus protocol underlying modern distributed systems.
TLA+ Thinking: How Formal Specification Prevents System Failures Before They Happen
Master the temporal logic and model checking techniques that catch distributed system bugs before deployment—not after production incidents.
The Byzantine Generals Problem Still Governs Modern Distributed Systems
How a 1982 impossibility theorem still defines the boundaries of consensus in every fault-tolerant system we build today.
Why Consensus Impossibility Defines Every Distributed System You Build
The 1985 theorem that silently dictates every tradeoff in your distributed architecture, revealing why consensus requires deliberate compromise.
Linearizability Is Not What You Think: The True Cost of Strong Consistency
Understanding linearizability's formal definition and proven coordination costs enables strategic consistency choices that balance correctness guarantees against performance requirements.
Logical Clocks: The Foundation of Distributed System Reasoning
How Lamport, vector, and hybrid clocks enable causal reasoning without synchronized physical time in distributed systems.