Between Monolith and Microfrontends - Advantages of a modulithic architecture and how an incremental refactoring can succeed

Based on my experience as Tech Lead, I recap the successful path my team took to modularise a monolithic React frontend - without micro frontends. The goal was to scale the software development of the frontend to multiple teams.

Starting from a monolithic architecture and a Git Flow integration and deployment process, we modularised the code incrementally and also made significant progress towards Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment (CI/CD).

It was important to never hinder the continuous development of new features therefore we favoured incremental refactorings over big bang approaches.

The technology-agnostic approach of the talk focuses on the principles of incremental refactoring. Particular attention is paid to creating the conditions that allow different teams to work on the same code base at the same time.

With this experience report, I want to encourage Tech Leads and Software Developers to approach refactorings incrementally and not to view architecture decisions in a binary way. You will also get tips on tooling and how to guide incremental refactoring organisationally.

Milena-Mercedes May

Trainer and Mentor for Software Engineering Leaders and Teams

Milena’s vision is to grow excellence in Software Engineering. She supports leadership to build high performing teams in Software Engineering organisations as a trainer and mentor for both leaders and their teams.

Milena has more than a decade of experience working hands-on as a Software Engineer and about four years of experience as a software engineering leader at various companies, always keen on learning more about how agile mindset, principles and practices enable teams to succeed.

Driven by her passion for learning, she’s also teaching coding and Software Engineering at different universities. As a founding member of the Digital Leadership Network she loves to drive this community forward.

Milena lives in Hamburg, Germany, and loves to work remotely and internationally.