core
System design foundations
Turn an ambiguous prompt into a scoped, quantified design conversation.
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chapter index
Start in order, or use the rubrics to find a useful entry point. Time includes assignments, constraint variations, and repeated drills. Reading the notes is one part of that budget.
Course project: Relay · build and evolve a private file service
Keep one design document for Relay, a tenant-aware file service. Start with 100k daily users, ten downloads per user/day, 10k uploads/day, 1 MB typical bodies, 30-day retention, and a 5× download peak. Files are private to workspaces. Treat these as fictional planning assumptions. Later chapters add previews, recovery, regional constraints, compute, and an assistant. Record each change rather than replacing the earlier version; the final review combines the whole packet. These activities share the chapter's existing practice budget.
Start the cumulative project →What do the depth labels mean?
Core builds essential vocabulary. Deep traces mechanisms. Studio applies them to a design. Patterns compares recurring structures. Capstone combines the course. Current covers update-sensitive platform contracts. Fluency practices concise explanations.
01Foundations
4 chapters · ~13h practice
01
~3h
4 checks
02
core
Networking, APIs & boundaries
Choose protocols, boundaries, and traffic controls from interaction shape—not habit.
~3h
4 checks
03
core
Data modeling & storage
Derive schemas, datastore choices, partitioning, and consistency from access patterns.
~4h
4 checks
04
core
Caching & performance
Use caches deliberately, calculate their value, and contain stale-data and stampede failure modes.
~3h
4 checks
02Distributed core
2 chapters · ~8h practice
05
core
Queues, streams & async systems
Design durable asynchronous flows with explicit ordering, duplicate, retry, and backpressure behavior.
~4h
4 checks
06
deep
Distributed systems fundamentals
Reason precisely about partial failure, partitions, coordination, and retry-safe correctness.
~4h
4 checks
03Production
3 chapters · ~9h practice
07
core
Reliability & resilience
Translate availability goals into redundancy, recovery, isolation, and graceful degradation.
~3h
4 checks
08
core
Observability & operations
Design a system that can be understood, debugged, rolled out, and operated under pressure.
~3h
4 checks
09
core
Security & abuse resistance
Threat-model identity, tenancy, data, and abuse as first-class architecture.
~3h
4 checks
04Global scale
1 chapters · ~3h practice
10
deep
Multi-region & global systems
Balance latency, availability, residency, and conflict across regions.
~3h
4 checks
05AI systems
2 chapters · ~9h practice
11
deep
High-scale compute systems
Schedule heterogeneous compute fairly, efficiently, and predictably under scarcity.
~4h
4 checks
12
deep
AI / LLM–flavored system design
Design an end-to-end AI service across streaming, GPUs, retrieval, tools, safety, cost, and evals.
~5h
4 checks
06Interview mode
3 chapters · ~14h practice
13
studio
Common interview design problems
Recognize reusable design shapes without forcing memorized solutions.
~6h
4 checks
14
studio
Deep-dive tradeoff drills
Compare alternatives with a repeatable, evidence-based decision frame.
~4h
4 checks
15
capstone
Interview execution framework
Run a clear 45–60 minute design interview and recover gracefully when pushed.
~4h
4 checks