The project
melino, a leading platform for record labels, faced growing operational challenges with its media management system. This system was running on a server that required constant maintenance and they struggled to handle increasing demand leading to a limit on their ability to scale and grow efficiently. Our mission was to understand melino’s pain points, what jobs they were doing with this server, and what specific frustrations it caused.
We discovered the key issues:
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High and fixed costs for maintaining the physical server
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Inability to scale during high-demand periods (like album releases)
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The complexity of managing growing amounts of media assets.
They needed a solution that would not only simplify their infrastructure but also make it future-proof. The decision was to migrate the entire server to AWS and leverage its serverless capabilities to create a scalable easy to maintain solution.
The goal
To provide a quality solution, our main objective was to dig deeper into melino’s server operations and find a cost-effective solution that could handle these operations while minimizing management efforts. To achieve this, we performed a detailed analysis of Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). The old server came with fixed costs from hosting and ongoing maintenance (server patches, upgrades, monitoring). This was a financial burden. By comparison, the TCO of AWS serverless would replace these fixed costs with a flexible pay-as-you-go model, allowing melino to only pay for the resources used. We aimed to lower operational costs by at least 30%, improve system scalability to manage peak loads seamlessly, and cut manual infrastructure management time by 50%.
The solution
The previous system had some opportunities for optimization, particularly during peak demand periods when scalability became a challenge, resulting in occasional outages and delays. Media files were stored in a way that limited efficiency, and managing updates and patches manually took up considerable time and resources. To enhance performance and reduce operational overhead, we migrated melino's PHP-based server to a serverless AWS architecture, focusing on automating key processes and eliminating server maintenance. Here's how we executed the solution
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Documenting and planning the migration: We began by documenting all server endpoints and dependencies, such as databases and mail services. This step was critical to translating the old PHP API code into detailed descriptions, making it easier to plan Lambda functions for each endpoint. We mapped out user requirements, and dependencies, and created accurate estimations, ensuring a smooth transition.
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Developing the API with Lambda: We developed 20 AWS Lambda functions to replace the old PHP server API. These functions handled everything from file uploads to metadata management and email notifications. This modular approach allowed for easy scalability, with each function designed to perform a specific task efficiently and reliably.
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Creating a cloud-native database and storage: To store customer data and media files, we built tables in Dynamo DB for customer IDs and other metadata, while Amazon S3 buckets were created for audio files and artwork. We set up lifecycle rules, enabled versioning, and managed permissions for the S3 buckets, creating test, stage, and production environments to ensure security and efficiency.
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Deploying the solution: We configured API Gateway and the Lambda functions for both staging and production environments, ensuring seamless deployment.
The result
The outcome was a fully scalable, serverless architecture that completely transformed the way our client manages their media assets. Here’s what we achieved:
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Zero server maintenance: By shifting to a serverless model, melino eliminated the need for ongoing server maintenance, including updates, patches, and monitoring. AWS automatically handles all backend infrastructure, allowing them to focus entirely on their core business.
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Cost reduction with on-demand pricing: The fixed costs associated with maintaining physical servers were replaced with a pay-as-you-go model. This reduced operational expenses, especially during off-peak periods, while also allowing them to scale up effortlessly during high-demand events like album releases.
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Efficient data management: The combination of Dynamo DB and S3 provided a secure, reliable, and scalable way to store and manage the client’s media assets, including customer IDs, audio files, and artwork. Features like versioning and lifecycle management further enhanced data security and recovery.
By migrating to a serverless architecture on AWS, we helped melino eliminate the burden of server maintenance and fixed infrastructure costs while offering a scalable, future-proof solution. The new architecture allows them to focus on their core business without worrying about the technical complexities of maintaining servers.
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