Backend

Server-side development, APIs, databases, and building robust backend systems.

Why Time Zones Break Your Code (and How to Fix It)

British Summer Time starts today. If your code stores local times, you probably have a bug. Here is how to handle time zones properly.

Practical guide to designing database schemas that scale cleanly, covering normalisation, denormalisation, naming and common mistakes.

A practical guide to API rate limiting. Covers algorithms, implementation patterns, response headers, and best practices for resilient APIs.

Learn how database indexes work, when to add them and how to avoid the most common indexing mistakes that slow your queries down.

A practical guide to authentication patterns including sessions, JWTs, OAuth 2.0, and passkeys, with trade-offs and implementation advice.

Learn the most important caching strategies for web applications, from browser and CDN caching to in-memory stores and cache invalidation patterns.

Essential API design principles every developer should know, covering naming, versioning, error handling, pagination, and real-world best practices.

Learn how to run database migrations safely with zero-downtime strategies, rollback plans, and practical tips for confident schema changes.

Learn how to build resilient APIs using retry logic and circuit breaker patterns to handle failures gracefully and prevent cascading outages.