The InfoQ Podcast Effective Error Handling: A Uniform Strategy for Heterogeneous Distributed Systems
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Oct 27, 2025 Jenish Shah, a backend engineer at Netflix with expertise in distributed systems, shares insights on effective error handling in complex environments. He discusses the evolution of microservices and the significance of clear error messages for user experience. Jenish introduces his centralized exception library, designed for uniformity across various protocols like HTTP and gRPC. He emphasizes the importance of observability metrics in error detection and offers advice on building reusable solutions to enhance engineering consistency.
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From Early Computers To Backend Engineering
- Jenish described his path from learning computers in India to backend engineering at Oracle, Amazon, and Netflix.
- He credits early math interest and mentorship from colleagues for a 20-year engineering journey.
Microservices Are Domain, Not Protocol
- Microservices are about separating business domains, not just protocols.
- Protocol choice (REST, gRPC, GraphQL) evolved to match different consumer needs and SLAs.
gRPC For East‑West Efficiency
- gRPC emerged for efficient internal (east-west) communication and better performance.
- Teams often expose both REST for external use and gRPC for internal callers with stricter SLAs.