The Downsides of Monorepo: The Flip Side of the Coin
As promising as Monorepos sound, they're not without their challenges. Let's explore these in detail to ensure you're making an informed choice.
The Expanding Universe Problem
Picture your Monorepo as a balloon. As you add more projects, the balloon inflates, eventually becoming hard to handle.
- How: The repository size grows exponentially with each added project.
- Why: This bloat can slow down operations like cloning and pulling, making them increasingly resource-intensive.
The Domino Effect
Imagine dropping a single domino and watching a whole line of them tumble down—that's the risk you run with Monorepos.
- How: A bug or breaking change in one project can adversely affect others.
- Why: It's challenging to isolate risks in a Monorepo, as changes are often interdependent.
The Access Control Puzzle
Think of a Monorepo as a mansion with multiple rooms, but only one main entrance key. Managing who gets into which room can be a logistical nightmare.
- How: Fine-grained access control is difficult to implement.
- Why: Permissions are typically set at the Monorepo level, making it hard to restrict access to individual projects.
The CI Time-Trap
Visualize your Continuous Integration (CI) process as a conveyor belt. Now, imagine that belt having to move an ever-growing pile of projects.
- How: Any change triggers a complete rebuild and retesting of all projects.
- Why: As the Monorepo grows, CI cycles become longer, delaying your development workflow.