Implementing the Saga pattern on Azure - Part 1

Starting today, we are launching a series of articles on the Saga pattern. Our goal is to blend theoretical concepts with practical implementation (in C#), offering clear illustrations of the associated challenges.

Microservices are becoming increasingly prevalent, aided by the growing adoption of cloud platforms. It is now feasible to promptly implement architectural best practices and instantiate multiple datastores effortlessly. Using Domain-Driven Design (DDD) terminology, this has facilitated the implementation of distinct bounded contexts with their own code and storage. Consequently, this paradigm has streamlined deployments and reduced delivery times. These benefits are now widely acknowledged.

On the flip side, microservices bring their own set of challenges. As data is now distributed across multiple repositories rather than centralized in a single datastore, we can no longer depend on SQL mechanisms to guarantee integrity and coherence, as developers have traditionally done for many years. In simpler terms, the transactional mechanisms previously provided by Oracle or Microsoft allowed us to confidently trust that our data was always in a consistent state. However, with distributed systems, maintaining data consistency has become a daily concern.

In this series of articles, our goal is to address these challenges by implementing a variation of the Saga pattern on the Azure platform.

• Implementing the Saga pattern in C# - Part 2
• Implementing the Saga pattern in C# - Part 3
• Implementing the Saga pattern in C# - Part 4

Without delay, let's initiate the examination of some straightforward use cases to gain a thorough understanding of the underlying concepts. Continue here.