Idempotency in 256 characters or less

This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Lucy Linder

This is a submission for DEV Computer Science Challenge v24.06.12: One Byte Explainer.

Explainer

Borrowed from Mathematics, an idempotent operation can run multiple times without changing the result. Writing to a file is idempotent, but appending to a file is not. A script using idempotent operations can thus fail midway and be restarted safely.

Additional Context

This idempotency concept is so important, yet too often unknown. It is the magic behind famous tools such as Terraform, Ansible, Kubernetes Manifests, etc. Fault-tolerant REST APIs are mostly idempotent REST APIs. It is everywhere, yet cleverly hidden. It is what makes operations repeatable and consistent.

There are better explanations online, but if my submission makes at least one person curious about this concept and want to know more, then I won already 🙂 !

This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Lucy Linder

Print Share Comment Cite Upload Translate Updates

APA

Lucy Linder | Sciencx (2024-06-23T14:52:48+00:00) Idempotency in 256 characters or less. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/

MLA

" » Idempotency in 256 characters or less." Lucy Linder | Sciencx - Sunday June 23, 2024, https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/

HARVARD

Lucy Linder | Sciencx Sunday June 23, 2024 » Idempotency in 256 characters or less., viewed ,<https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/>

VANCOUVER

Lucy Linder | Sciencx - » Idempotency in 256 characters or less. [Internet]. [Accessed ]. Available from: https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/

CHICAGO

" » Idempotency in 256 characters or less." Lucy Linder | Sciencx - Accessed . https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/

IEEE

" » Idempotency in 256 characters or less." Lucy Linder | Sciencx [Online]. Available: https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/. [Accessed: ]

rf:citation

» Idempotency in 256 characters or less | Lucy Linder | Sciencx | https://www.scien.cx/2024/06/23/idempotency-in-256-characters-or-less/ |

Please log in to upload a file.

There are no updates yet.
Click the Upload button above to add an update.

You must be logged in to translate posts. Please log in or register.