Posts Tagged ‘BenoitViguier’
[PHPForumParis2022] BFF: Our Best Friend Forever for Frontend Applications? – Valentin Claras
Valentin Claras, a seasoned team leader at Bedrock, delivered a compelling session at PHP Forum Paris 2022, exploring the Backend for Frontend (BFF) pattern as a solution for managing complex frontend applications. With over a decade of development experience, Valentin shared insights from his work at Bedrock, formerly MC6, illustrating how BFF streamlines frontend-backend interactions. His presentation, dense with practical examples, highlighted the pattern’s potential to enhance performance and maintainability in PHP-driven projects.
Understanding the BFF Pattern
Valentin introduced the BFF pattern as a specialized backend layer tailored to specific frontend needs, acting as a “glue” between diverse APIs and client applications. Drawing from Bedrock’s streaming platform, he explained how BFF aggregates data from multiple backend services, simplifying frontend development. By reducing the complexity of direct API calls, BFF enables faster iteration and better user experiences, particularly for applications with varied frontend requirements like web and mobile interfaces.
Optimizing Performance with Asynchronous Processing
Addressing performance concerns, Valentin detailed Bedrock’s use of the Tornado engine to handle asynchronous API calls within the BFF layer. He explained how parallelizing 10 to 20 API requests ensures reasonable response times, even under heavy loads. Valentin referenced prior talks by colleague Benoit Viguier, emphasizing the importance of non-sequential processing to maintain efficiency. This approach, he argued, mitigates the risk of performance bottlenecks, making BFF a viable solution for high-traffic applications.
Maintaining Clear Boundaries
Valentin emphasized the importance of keeping BFF’s responsibilities minimal to avoid it becoming a monolithic service. At Bedrock, the BFF focuses solely on data aggregation and transformation, leaving business logic to dedicated services. This clear separation ensures maintainability and scalability, preventing the BFF from absorbing unrelated responsibilities. Valentin’s insights, grounded in real-world challenges, offered a blueprint for developers aiming to implement BFF effectively in their PHP projects.
Fostering Collaborative Development
Concluding, Valentin highlighted BFF’s role in fostering collaboration between frontend and backend teams. By providing a unified interface, BFF reduces miscommunication and aligns development efforts. He encouraged developers to adopt BFF incrementally, leveraging its flexibility to enhance project workflows. Valentin’s practical approach inspired attendees to explore BFF as a tool for building robust, frontend-friendly PHP applications, drawing from Bedrock’s successful implementation.
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[PHPForumParis2021] Fiber: The Gateway to Asynchronous PHP – Benoit Viguier
Benoit Viguier, a developer at Bedrock, enthralled the Forum PHP 2021 audience with an exploration of PHP 8.1’s Fiber feature, a groundbreaking step toward asynchronous programming. With a history of discussing async development at AFUP events, Benoit shared early experiments with Fibers, positioning them as a future cornerstone of PHP. His talk blended technical insight with forward-thinking optimism, urging developers to embrace this new paradigm. This post covers three themes: understanding Fibers, practical applications, and the need for standards.
Understanding Fibers
Benoit Viguier introduced Fibers as a low-level feature in PHP 8.1, enabling lightweight, cooperative concurrency. Unlike traditional threading, Fibers allow developers to pause and resume execution without blocking the main thread, ideal for I/O-heavy tasks. Drawing on his work at Bedrock, Benoit explained how Fibers extend PHP’s async capabilities, building on libraries like Amphp and ReactPHP. His clear explanation demystified this cutting-edge feature for the audience.
Practical Applications
Delving into practical use cases, Benoit showcased how Fibers enhance performance in applications like Bedrock’s streaming platforms, such as 6play and Salto. By enabling non-blocking HTTP requests and database queries, Fibers reduce latency and improve user experience. Benoit shared early experiments, noting that while Fibers are not yet production-ready, their potential to streamline async workflows is immense, particularly for high-traffic systems requiring real-time responsiveness.
The Need for Standards
Benoit concluded by advocating for a standardized async ecosystem in PHP. He highlighted recent collaborations between Amphp and ReactPHP teams to propose a PSR standard for Fibers, fostering interoperability. By making libraries “Fiber-ready,” developers can create reusable, non-blocking APIs. Benoit’s vision for a unified async framework, inspired by his work at Bedrock, positions Fibers as a potential “killer feature” for PHP, encouraging community contributions to shape its future.