How to Build a Perfect Startup Technology Stack for your Business?

[1] Requirements

1. The most basic step before you start to select the tech stack for your business is to pen down the requirements and goals you wish to achieve with the software you are going to build.
2. Next define your target audience. Answer questions like - Is your application going to serve an unknown demographic of users? Or,  is it going to be used by a bunch of employees within an organization?
3. Finally the scale of the solution. Is the application expected to serve a static number of users in perpetuity? Or is the number of users expected to continuously increase over time?

Once we have the answer to these questions, we can curate a list of technologies that fit well in the chosen scenarios. Providing our foundational list of technologies that will collectively be the core part of the first tech stack draft.

[2] Developer’s Skillset And Team Size

This is one of the points where choosing your tech stack as early as possible works in your favor. Here’s why -

1. If you are finalizing your tech stack after you have curated most of your technical team then in that case your options are limited to the technologies your developers are proficient with.
2. Because, for them learning a new language with complete proficiency can take months, which isn’t sustainable for a business. Outsourcing your work to a software development company works as a reliable alternative in this scenario.
3. However, if you somehow manage to finalize your tech stack before getting most of the team together, you can hire your team based on their expertise in the technologies included in your tech stack.

In the latter method, you are not limited to the technologies that your team has a grip on. You can literally choose any technology you want and then hire a team/employees based on your choices.

[3] Features Functionality and Overall Project Scope

This can be considered a detailed branch of the requirements point discussed previously, here you basically get into the details of your project at a molecular level, taking every single feature, integration, and module you wish to include under consideration -

1. If your features are inclined more towards the complicated side, like real-time communication, data analysis with a large flow of information, then you have to choose your technologies accordingly.
2. It is also crucial to include complementary technologies in your stack. For example - selecting a UI that complements the related framework, or choosing the set of APIs and other 3rd party tools that integrate seamlessly with your modules.

[4] Budget

Some technologies are expensive to leverage but provide a wide range of functionalities, while others are completely free to use but do not complete a very robust palette of functions.

1. Now, depending on how important a certain module is compared to others, you can mix and match between these expensive and free to use technologies to balance the overall budget of the project.
2. Then there’s maintenance costs, some technologies might be cheaper or even free to develop, but their maintenance costs are relatively high due to various reasons such as - limited developer pool, complex open source setup with no support, etc.

[5] Security Needs

It is crucial to implement technologies that provide a secure environment during operations. Given the fact that a tech stack has multiple technologies it is crucial for the team to evaluate each technology in terms of security carefully -

1. Go through the technology’s data protection guidelines and scour through online forums to identify any possible vulnerabilities of the technologies along with their workarounds. Once you have all of the information, take a call on whether you wish to include the technology in the stack or not.
2. Tally the compliance requirements of your industry with the technologies you are willing to bring onboard. Make sure all of them are compliant to avoid any future complications.
3. Prioritize technologies with a strong and active community and with regular security updates. These typically have a lower risk of vulnerabilities and even if one is detected, they are quickly patched.

[A] Operating System

It provides the environment that allows all the other applications to run/operate. It is one of the foundational parts of any tech stack being leveraged for the development of the software, as all the other technologies need an OS to execute. It is important to choose the right operating system to maximize the efficiency of the development process.

A lot of it comes down to the preferences of the developers working on the project as well. For example -  while most of the mainstream backend programming languages like Python and Java are compatible with all of the major operating systems like - Windows, MacOs and Linux, developers prefer to use Linux for the development in most cases due to its stable and command line centric nature.

[B] Database

These can be considered as the application’s warehouses, where all of the data is stored, arranged, and retrieved as per the requirements and tasks being performed. Having reliable database options in your tech stack that perform consistently is extremely important to further enhance the overall stability of the application.

This especially helps the application to shine while handling high user footfall or while performing tasks that require a constant supply of data in order to make decisions or suggestions. It reflects in the user satisfaction metrics as well since the data loads faster, comes from a secured environment, and above all, returns accurate results.

[C] Front-end

Front-end technologies support the interface between the application and the users, providing them with a visual means to communicate their requirements to the application with a few taps/clicks. The front end has a major role in helping the users to understand the application and form an opinion about it.

An application with a clean and minimalistic UI along with a well-thought-out and intuitive arrangement of features is generally considered to be a premium product. While a clumsy UI with randomly placed features is a sign of a poorly developed application.

[D] Back-end

This acts as the brain of the software - managing the operations across various modules and executing the core functionalities. Back-end technologies are leveraged to build the overall logic of the software that governs the server-side activities that aren’t directly visible to the users. 

Having a strong back-end setup ensures the solution is handling & processing requests while managing the resources consistently and efficiently. It improves collaboration between the application verticals enhancing the overall experience for the users.

[E] Server

Servers are responsible for hosting the back-end of the application, managing the cloud and network resources and addressing the client requests to orchestrate the overall accommodation providing the software with a reliable environment to operate in.

Having reliable hosting servers (Like: Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure) not only enables better performance, it also enables seamless scaling of the software whenever needed. There are other options for on-premise servers as well, but they are losing relevance rapidly.

[F] APIs

APIs allow your software to communicate with third-party software solutions or with different modules within its own architecture, kinda like the nervous system that connects the brain (Read: back-end) to the other parts of the application.

A well-designed API facilitates modularity, an architecture that has a plethora of benefits by itself including optimal upgrades, minimal downtime, selective scalability and much more. Integrations with third party solutions is also easier with the presence of appropriate API documentations that can further expand the functionalities offered by a software.

[i] MEAN Stack

MEAN stands as an abbreviation for - MongoDB, Express.js, Angular.js, & Node.js. Quite noticeably it is a JavaScript favoring approach that offers a unified language for both front-end and back-end technologies allowing rapid development with minimum complexity.

1. Having an Open Source setup, the developers working with a mean stack gain free access to the grand community of active developers providing extensive documentations and forum discussions covering almost every possible issue.
2. MEAN has a reputation for being a scalable techstack as it leverages MongoDB, a NoSQL database. Context: NoSQL databases are known for being easily scalable due to their ability to scale horizontally.
3. Being compatible across all the major operating systems including Linux allows developers to easily adapt to this stack. And it doubles down on the ease factor with the performance boost provided by Node.js’ event driven architecture allowing it to handle concurrent users with ease.

[ii] MERN Stack

MERN stands short for - MongoDB, Express.js, React.js, and Node.js. Similar to MEAN, MERN is also a Javascript centric framework, however, instead of using Angular, React comes as a replacement for handling the front-end operations. 

1. React stands superior to Angular while developing complex UIs due to its component based architecture. It also promotes reusability of modules that cuts down the development time.
2. For dynamic applications, React provides a virtual DOM that enhances the performance and efficiency of the overall solution.
3. Additionally, it also inherits most of the benefits that we discussed for MEAN stack including the Open Source, NoSQL, Cross Platform compatibility benefits.

[iii] LAMP Stack

LAMP stands for Linux, Apache, MySQL, & PHP. It is particularly popular for web development and has become a standard choice for it due to its stack of stable and reliable technologies. Being open source as well, LAMP stack is a resource friendly option for businesses with a bunch of benefits -

1. PHP allows server side scripting that supports the developers efficiency combining it with MySQLs solid relational database the software is built in the best conditions possible.
2. Although LAMP is primarily based on Linux as it’s core operating system, there are other variations of LAMP that allow the use of other OS options to help the devs meet their specific needs. WAMP and MAMP are the most popular examples with the first letters representing Windows and MacOS operating systems respectively.

[iv] Python Stack

The Python stack works with a plethora of technologies and has been the choice of many developers when it comes to web development or artificial intelligence related projects due to the versatile and readable nature of the language.

1. The Python stack is supported by a bunch of extremely reliable frameworks like Django and Flask that provide a number of features for web development.
2. As mentioned Python’s syntax is readable and simple compared to other programming languages, making it beginner friendly. This is the reason many developers start off with Python as their very first programming language.
3. Python has a massive community of developers with an elaborate list of libraries and other resources, which further improves the development time and assists developers to tackle niche issues that they might face.

[v] Java Stack

The Java stack is typically categorized as the ideal choice for enterprise level applications due to its high security standards, overall stability and scalability options. Equipped with technologies like Spring, Hibernate, Apache Tomcat and others, the Java stack provides an environment to build robust and high performance solutions.

1. Java has its own development ecosystem that includes multiple libraries, tools, frameworks, and a virtual machine called JVM to execute the bytecode.
2. Java also has its own Just-In-Time compiler and advanced garbage collecting protocols that further enhance the performance of the application especially when working with continuously running applications.
3. Java provides a security manager, bytecode verification functionality and a long list of security APIs making it a suitable choice for applications needing high levels of security. (Read: enterprise applications)

[a] Performance Issues

Mindless techstacks may result in slow loading speeds and high latency due to lack of optimization and synergy between the various technologies used. This can cause complications during the development and even lead to frustration among the users.

[b] Security Limitations

Using technologies that do not receive frequent updates and are abandoned by the developers can make your solution vulnerable to any external threats. Development teams might have to patch these issues themselves later on, that will cost your business a lot of time and effort.

[c] Scalability Bottlenecks

Choosing multiple licensed technologies for your tech stack might be a wrong business decision. In case, there is a need to scale up the business later on, being unable to afford all the upgrades may force the devs to compromise in some areas. And without these upgrades the solution may start crashing and slowing down.

[d] Integration Related Problems

Having a weak technological foundation will inevitably cause complications whenever the team attempts a new integration to the existing model. Going back to the old framework, identifying the cause behind the issue and fixing it will yet again prove to be counterproductive compared to building a firm foundation from the very inception.