Composable Enterprise: The Evolution of MACH and Jamstack
A few months ago I spoke with some developers about the need for the Jamstack to become more streamlined and return to its composable roots, because the trendy web architecture had become too complicated over the years. That desire by developers for simplicity and modularity seems to be partly driving the recent growth in support for the MACH architecture, which also focuses on providing a modular tech stack and giving developers more freedom to choose the tools and services right for their needs.
An Introduction to MACH
To find out what MACH is all about, I reached out to Mark Demeny, a Senior Director of Product Management for Yext and a Technology Analyst for the MACH Alliance, a vendor-neutral, not-for-profit industry group that advocates for adoption of MACH architecture.
“MACH stands for Microservices, API-first, Cloud native SaaS, Headless, and represents both technical standards but also principles of building software by assembling various components into larger stacks,” said Demeny. “These MACH principles enable a swappable enterprise tech stack, in which every component is pluggable, scalable and replaceable.”
MACH is broader than Jamstack because “it covers many other product types and verticals (such as commerce)” and uses “a microservices and cloud approach.”
– Mark Demeny, MACH Alliance
With regards to the similarities between the Jamstack and MACH, Demeny stressed their similar headless approaches. “Jamstack and MACH are closely related in that they both depend on headless approaches in order to enable maximum flexibility for frontend choice for web development,” said Demeny. “However, MACH is broader in that it covers many other product types and verticals (such as commerce) as well, including principles for vendors — such as a microservices and cloud approach — which allow those original headless principles to scale to support larger enterprise use cases.”
Bringing Composable Web Development to the Enterprise
That headless and composable approach helps give maximum flexibility to developers looking for best-of-breed services when building their tech stack, particularly for dev teams working in mid to larger enterprises. That approach has seen vendor membership in the MACH Alliance increase dramatically over the last few years, with commerce provider Kibo becoming the 101st member of the alliance in early 2004.
“MACH architecture agility stems from modularity. Organizations can respond to changing requirements and adopt new technologies faster.”
– Meagan White, Kibo
According to Meagan White, Head of Marketing at Kibo, the benefits of that composable approach translate into more options and flexibility for Kibo’s customers.
“Because MACH architecture is inherently modular, organizations can build and maintain their digital systems as a collection of independent microservices, which means it’s easier to adapt, scale, and replace components without disrupting the entire system,” said White. “By contrast, other approaches tend to be monolithic, which makes updates harder and more time-consuming. MACH architecture agility stems from modularity. Organizations can respond to changing requirements and adopt new technologies faster without struggles with reengineering. Furthermore, because MACH systems are inherently cloud-native, they can scale on demand, which lowers infrastructure costs.”
Lisa Grayston, General Manager of Commerce at Coveo, agrees that the modular, composable MACH approach resonates with their customer needs as well.
“Instead of using one-size-fits-all technology, MACH architecture gives businesses the freedom to choose from the best tools on the market today…”
– Lisa Grayston, Coveo
“MACH architecture provides the agility [that] digital leaders need to remain relevant as customer needs change. Instead of using one-size-fits-all technology, MACH architecture gives businesses the freedom to choose from the best tools on the market today and provide a structure that makes it easy to add, replace, or remove technologies in the future,” said Grayston. She added that her company “works with large enterprises around the world that have complex requirements” and so MACH is a good match for those customers.
Can MACH Learn From the Jamstack?
All of the vendors I spoke with commented on some of the similarities between the composable approaches adopted by the Jamstack and MACH, and saw parallels — and potential learnings — that the MACH architecture could take from the evolution of the Jamstack.
“Both Jamstack and MACH architectures promote modularity and flexibility in system design, which offers developers the flexibility to choose the best components and services while ensuring compatibility and interoperability,” said White. “This empowers them to build tailored solutions without unnecessary complexity.”
Grayston from Coveo acknowledges the criticism that the Jamstack received from being “too loosely defined” and “drifting from its original principles”, and sees those developments as cautionary notes for the MACH Alliance. She expressed confidence that the MACH Alliance had taken steps to avoid some of the same issues.
“These measures include establishing clear definitions of what MACH is and isn’t, offering a rigorous certification process, and supporting an advisory board that provides guidance, advice, and strategic insights to the Executive Board,” said Grayston.
Integrated vs. Composable
Dries Buytaert, the founder of Drupal and CTO and co-founder of Acquia, recently authored a blog post entitled The new old: Jamstack and MACH’s journey towards traditional CMS concepts. It provides his thoughts on how Jamstack, MACH, and traditional CMSes are evolving, and pokes holes in some of the loftier claims of Jamstack and MACH marketing efforts.
In his post, Buytaert argues that many of the Jamstack’s advantages have been overstated. “The notion that Jamstack deployments are easy is debatable. In reality, it can be a frustrating task, both for developers and marketers, but especially for marketers,” wrote Buytaert. “I’m also critical of Jamstack’s purported performance benefits. In short, Jamstack, initially known for its static site generation and simplicity, is growing into something more dynamic and complex. This is a positive evolution driven by the market’s need.”
“MACH is a collection of independent services, operating without relying on an underlying core platform.”
– Dries Buytaert, founder of Drupal
Buytaert argues that the evolution of Jamstack is narrowing the gap with traditional CMS platforms, noting that “Jamstack offers a pure headless approach, while traditional CMSes offer both headless and integrated options.” Buytaert also suggests that the evolution of the Jamstack is making it more similar to the MACH architecture.
“Drupal and WordPress extend their capabilities by adding modules to a ‘core platform’, while MACH is a collection of independent services, operating without relying on an underlying core platform,” he noted. “In recent years, we’ve witnessed a variety of technical approaches in the CMS/DXP landscape, with MACH, Jamstack, decoupled, and headless architectures each carving out their paths. Initially, these paths appeared to diverge. However, we’re now seeing a trend of convergence, where different systems are learning from each other and integrating their unique strengths.”
On bridging the divide between MACH and traditional CMS platforms, Buytaert suggests that “…MACH may need to broaden its scope to encompass shared services commonly found in the core platform of traditional CMSes. That would help with developer cost, composability and user-friendliness.”
Buytaert also suggests that the lack of a core, common platform and too much modularity can result in a fragmented, disjointed user experience. He calls this “MACH fatigue.”
“…the advantage of MACH is the ability to easily change elements of the stack as needs change or vendors evolve.”
– Mark Demeny, MACH Alliance
Demeny agrees that one approach may not be the best fit for every use case.
“MACH is well suited to larger use cases where an organization may need to combine elements of commerce, content management, customer data and other applications in a differentiated customer experience,” he said. “The key word here is differentiated — and the advantage of MACH is the ability to easily change elements of the stack as needs change or vendors evolve. Of course, this approach is not for everyone — if your needs are simple and a single vendor provides everything you need out-of-the-box then MACH may not be appropriate, as it does require extra work and understanding of the moving pieces and how they are composed into a single customer experience.”
For his part, Buytaert suggested in his post that an ideal solution “…might be described as ‘loosely-coupled architectures with a highly integrated user experience.’”
Enterprise Appeal and the Evolution of Composable
As the Jamstack and the MACH Architecture continue to evolve, categorizing the MACH architecture as “Jamstack for the enterprise” might not entirely be accurate, but it’s undeniable that the MACH approach has been gaining traction among vendors and has increasing appeal to enterprise customers.
Demeny points out that the MACH Alliance recently celebrated passing the 100 certified member mark, and believes that the organization and the MACH architecture are entering a new phase.
The MACH approach has been gaining traction among vendors and has increasing appeal to enterprise customers.
“This also means that the audience profile of the MACH community and buyers is starting to shift a bit from developers to more business-focused stakeholders,” said Demeny. ”As a result, the Alliance is producing more work around interoperability understanding and standards in order to help these newer stakeholders understand and navigate the landscape.”
Regardless of what tech stack developers and organizations choose, the evolution of the Jamstack and the MACH architecture are providing more options and flexibility for developers. That also extends to the integrated vs. modular landscape, which now has more options than ever for developers looking to find the tech stack sweet spot for their specific organization or use case.
“In the end, the success of any platform is judged by how effectively it delivers a good user experience and cost efficiency, regardless of its architecture,” writes Buytaert. “The focus needs to move away from architectural considerations to how these technologies can create more intuitive, powerful platforms for end users.”
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