> I'm sure it's possible to create a consistent system but I'm also sure it's not practical. No one does it.
Billions of dollars flow through fully consistent systems every day. The basic IT concept for smaller hedge funds is "buy the biggest MSSQL machine available on the planet and move on." The big ones have custom frameworks that resemble Frank's arguments here, though the abstractions are different.
> The basic IT concept for smaller hedge funds is "buy the biggest MSSQL machine available on the planet and move on."
And the result is exactly what grandparent was complaining about: sure your database server is full ACID, but a trader is looking at numbers on their screen that are out of date (and pressing the trade button on that basis), and that's what actually matters.
Billions of dollars flow through fully consistent systems every day. The basic IT concept for smaller hedge funds is "buy the biggest MSSQL machine available on the planet and move on." The big ones have custom frameworks that resemble Frank's arguments here, though the abstractions are different.