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Dev.to
Dev.to
7/3/2026
The original title is "System Design Chapter 1: Fundamentals: Servers, Latency, Request Flow and Throughput"

The original title is "System Design Chapter 1: Fundamentals: Servers, Latency, Request Flow and Throughput"

Original: System Design Chapter 1: Fundamentals: Servers, Latency, Request Flow and Throughput

Short summary

System design fundamentals: a server is simply a program listening on a port for requests and responding. Latency (single-request speed) and throughput (requests-per-second) are distinct metrics that move independently and are often confused. Every scaling decision—caching, replication, load-balancing—trades off one benefit for a cost elsewhere.

  • A server is defined by behavior (listening and responding), not hardware or size
  • Latency and throughput are separate metrics; improving one can worsen the other
  • All system design decisions involve unavoidable tradeoffs between cost, performance, consistency, and data freshness

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