Dynamo (paper) conceptpaper
DeCandia et al.
DeCandia et al. (Amazon), 2007. Introduced the AP-side architecture that powers DynamoDB, Cassandra, Riak, Voldemort. Key ideas: consistent hashing for partitioning, vector clocks for conflict detection, sloppy quorum + hinted handoff for write availability during partitions, anti-entropy via Merkle trees, gossip-based membership. The paper proved that giving up linearizability buys you availability and operational simplicity at scale — and shaped a decade of NoSQL design. Not the right answer for every workload, but understanding Dynamo is necessary to understand the modern database landscape.