Cloud-native application architecture

The following diagram illustrates the architecture of a cloud-native application. As we can observe, the architecture is composed of different microservices, each serving a specific operation in our application. The microservices can then coordinate with each other thanks to an orchestration layer. On the other hand, requests coming from client apps are routed and sent to the specialized microservice thanks to the API gateway.

Microservices, API gateway, and service mesh are essential practices in the cloud-native arena. In this section, we will explore these concepts from an architectural perspective of cloud-native applications:

Figure 2.4 – A sample cloud-native architecture

Components of a cloud-native application – the building blocks

First, let’s understand the key building blocks of a cloud-native application. Imagine constructing a Lego structure; you wouldn’t use one giant...