Re:Firebase expands to become a unified app platform
by CobrastanJorji on Wednesday May 18, 2016 @04:46PM
(#11725798)
That MIGHT be true, but it's not apparent from their statement. Just because it costs N to build a product on technology X and costs M to migrate an existing product to technology Y does not mean that it would have cost N + M to implement the product on technology Y in the first place.
Re:Firebase expands to become a unified app platform
by carolus4 on Thursday May 19, 2016 @04:48AM
(#11728866)
I think the point made above is that it's enough for implementation(X) < implementation(Y) in order to sway some people to technology X. Rapid prototyping is an example of this, since the time-value of feedback is higher before the product is well defined.
Re:Firebase expands to become a unified app platform
by dandelany on Thursday May 19, 2016 @01:52PM
(#11732132)
You are correct of course, my point is that even if cost(implementing Y originally) < cost(implementing X and later migrating to Y) it may still be worth it, because the cost has been deferred. Time is often a lot more valuable in early stages of a startup.
Re:Firebase expands to become a unified app platform
by vacri on Thursday May 19, 2016 @02:21AM
(#11728391)
From experience, changing databases on a product in flight is not trivial. Even moving our production database from an external vendor to an in-house location (exact same database engine and version) was a decent-size task, and would have been much, much easier with greenfields or a chunk of downtime.
Which means you presumably saved months initially by using Azure, and got your product to market sooner. Everyone should be aware of the dangers of lock-in, and should carefully consider the value of it vs. the liability they're taking on. But I wouldn't say never use products like this. The value-add can be significant, even taking into account the fact that you may have to migrate off of it someday.