To build something like Twitter

Cianos

Hey,
Apologies for the vague question, but I have an idea for a site/service which in many ways would be similar to Twitter. I'm wondering in a very loose manner of speaking how big an undertaking it would be to build something like Twitter?! Are we talking about hundreds of hours of work, or thousands?!

Many thanks!

Evil Phil

You could use StatusNet which is a open source micro-blogging platform. They have a hosted version where you pretty much ready to rock-and-roll and a down-loadable version that you can customize and put online yourself.

fenderlvr

Twitter is actually really simple to code. Not a huge undertaking until you get the amount of users that Twitter has. Then you'll have huge infrastructure challenges.

Webmonkey

I don't think it's the code that is the problem. The problem lies in making it scalable if you were to grow as big as twitter.

Edit: Okay i'm re iterating what already said!

Cianos

fenderlvr wrote: »

Twitter is actually really simple to code. Not a huge undertaking until you get the amount of users that Twitter has. Then you'll have huge infrastructure challenges.

Isn't this a problem you want to have?

Giblet

Cianos wrote: »

Isn't this a problem you want to have?

Only if you can solve it.

Adam

Giblet wrote: »

Only if you can solve it.

how does one solve it, out of curiosity? is there some light reading i can do on the subject? i can visualize how to replicate twitter pretty much, using php/mysql db, but when do things start becoming a problem and how would i go about improving load capabilities?

Giblet

Adam wrote: »

how does one solve it, out of curiosity? is there some light reading i can do on the subject? i can visualize how to replicate twitter pretty much, using php/mysql db, but when do things start becoming a problem and how would i go about improving load capabilities?

Writing scalable software, having the correct hardware, not overdoing it by throwing hardware at a software problem. There are loads of ways to combat it. Twitter had its share of problems at the start, and unfortunately, throwing money at the problem wasn't the solution.

bobbytables

Cianos wrote: »

Isn't this a problem you want to have?

It is only if there is a positive and strong correlation between scale and profitability. E.g. I could put together a service online in the morning that may be of use to lots of people. Lets say I get the traffic and I need to expand my infrastructure to support this, what incentive do I have to pay for that expansion?

Overflow

Consider designing the app for cloud based hosting services, that way you can start small and scale as demand increases.