Backends Should be Designed for Product Developers

James Cowling, CTO and co-founder of Convex, discusses the challenges faced by product developers due to the complex nature of current backend platforms and advocates for a shift towards more developer-friendly backends. He argues that traditional backend systems, while powerful, have become overly complex and difficult for developers to manage, particularly concerning data models, query languages like SQL, and system concerns like caching and data consistency. Cowling highlights the need for improved abstractions that simplify backend interactions, suggesting that platforms should function more like libraries with clean APIs, allowing developers to focus on building applications without being bogged down by backend complexities. He introduces Convex as a solution, emphasizing its ability to provide dynamic consistent caching, true end-to-end type safety, and the integration of Typescript functions within the database, all aimed at enhancing the developer experience and enabling faster, more efficient application development.