What the heck does "serverless" mean?

honey the codewitch

It seems to be all the rage in web circles. I'm picturing an app that runs entirely in a browser and connects via web based APIs to do its back end processing, but that's my wild guess. How close am I? I've never gotten a clear answer out of google.

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Richard Deeming

Serverless computing - Wikipedia[^]:

Serverless computing is a cloud computing execution model in which the cloud provider allocates machine resources on demand, taking care of the servers on behalf of their customers. "Serverless" is a misnomer in the sense that servers are still used by cloud service providers to execute code for developers.

So basically, it's marketing BS. :)

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Amarnath S

honey the codewitch wrote:

app that runs entirely in a browser

Something like "thin client", isn't it?

honey the codewitch

Maybe that's why I can't understand it even after it's explained. :~

Check out my IoT graphics library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx And my IoT UI/User Experience library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix

RickZeeland

serverless-economic-impact.png[^]

honey the codewitch

No idea. I'm grasping over here. It's like "semantic web" - people can explain it to me, and I still don't understand it. I was hoping maybe someone here could unstupid me but apparently it will remain a mystery. Oh well, as it's not my arena anyway. :laugh:

Check out my IoT graphics library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/gfx And my IoT UI/User Experience library here: https://honeythecodewitch.com/uix

Mircea Neacsu

That's what I learned from "Cloud Computing for Dummies": "cloud" = There is no frigging cloud; it's someone else's computer. "serverless" = There is always a frigging server; it's a cloud server. :laugh:

Mircea

Maximilien

I understand it as not having a dedicated server.

CI/CD = Continuous Impediment/Continuous Despair

theoldfool

Just means "someone else's server" Like he said, "marketing BS"

>64 Some days the dragon wins. Suck it up.

Jeremy Falcon

Amarnath S wrote:

Something like "thin client", isn't it?

It would be more like thick client. Keep in mind, everything is thin client on the web when compared to desktop software. But serverless would be akin to thick client.

Jeremy Falcon

Jeremy Falcon

There's always a server; otherwise, there would be no way to deliver the site to a user outside of shipping them a USB drive, etc. However, the payload delivered does all of its processing on the client once it's delivered. It doesn't have its own backend server in the traditional sense where it's making API calls to its own backend. External API calls are cool though, but the idea is all of the processing needed is done on the client and nothing else.

Jeremy Falcon

raddevus

Richard Deeming wrote:

So basically, it's marketing BS.

What in the IT world isn't? :rolleyes:

raddevus

It's funny that you mention "what is serverless" because I started reading the book below a few days ago. Read the 1st 3 chapters and i'm still not exactly sure. :laugh: You need to read this entire book, Serverless as a Game Changer: How to Get the Most Out of the Cloud[^] then you still won't know what it is. :rolleyes:

raddevus

Here's what it actually means -- it means having someone else manage your servers where your stuff runs... From the book, Serverless as a Game Changer: How to Get the Most Out of the Cloud[^]

Quote:

Serverless Means Not Our Uptime One of the simplest definitions of Serverless, and the principal way I think about fully Serverless applications, is that the responsibility for keeping applications running is not the responsibility of the organization that developed the applications.

Yes, that's marketing -- not really technology!

raddevus

You nailed it! That's exactly what it means and that's exactly why it's so confusing to people who actually understand technology. See my answer at: The Lounge[^]

Maximilien

of course. But in the good old days, we had to manage our own hardware/servers (or hire an external company to host the hardware ) If we needed extra power, we just bought extra hardware/servers. I think that was the case for CodeProject at one point; they had off-siteserver racks. I can't find the page with the description of the rat cage.

CI/CD = Continuous Impediment/Continuous Despair

dandy72

theoldfool wrote:

Just means "someone else's server"

That's always been my own informal definition as well, purely based on my own guesses.

FreedMalloc

That's exactly what I tell my non-techy friends and family when they ask what "the cloud" means. I tell them to substitute the phrase "somebody else's computer" for "the cloud" and they'll know all they need to know. And "serverless" is just "somebody else's server". Not that there's anything wrong with that! :laugh:

Greg Utas

The "centralized versus distributed" debate is an ongoing source of techno-marketing hype. Mainframes gave way to workstations gave way to servers gave way to desktops gave way to the cloud.

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Jeremy Falcon

That's not the point. The point is there is still a server, but the code doesn't execute on the server. The topic was what is serverless, not how to manage a server.

Jeremy Falcon