From PHP to Next.js: What Trivago Learned Rewriting Its Web App

Hotel search service Trivago rewrote its frontend in Typescript on the Next.js framework, replacing a PHP codebase on a homegrown JavaScript framework, Melody. From April 2020 until late 2021 the platform team created, tested and deployed the new application which reduced page size by up to 37%, while increasing daily code releases.

Engineering is all about tradeoffs, and Tom Bartel, Trivago Team Lead Interface Platform, does an excellent job illustrating the tradeoffs that led to the platform rewrite in his recent blog post. It was a massive undertaking, especially when nothing is inherently “wrong” or broken with the codebase.

What was working? Well, the site at large was. Users were enjoying full functionality on the web and mobile. There was a trained engineering team with many who enjoyed their functional job duties.

What “wasn’t working”? Melody was homegrown so it wasn’t widespread. The ecosystem was small, documentation was limited, and the engineering goes to’s (i.e. Google and Stack Overflow) were very limited or no help at all. There were at max two core maintainers with at least one on-call at all times. It was challenging to onboard new employees and some voiced concerns that they were learning and nurturing non-transferable skills.

Double down on Melody? Allocate resources to modernize the framework, update and add quality documentation, and train engineers to maintain? Or stare down …

…The Blank Page

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Article source: https://article-realm.com/article/Computers/Software/23444-From-PHP-to-Next-js-What-Trivago-Learned-Rewriting-Its-Web-App.html