Asking about constraints

Asking about constraints surfaces scale, latency, consistency, accessibility, security, team skills, budget, timeline, compliance, and legacy systems before you commit to a design. Missing constraints produces elegant wrong answers.

| Constraint | Example question | |------------|------------------| | Scale | DAU, QPS, data size growth? | | Latency | p95 target, real-time vs eventual? | | Consistency | Strong vs eventual OK for reads? | | Security | PII, tenancy, audit, compliance regime? | | Team | Familiar stack, on-call capacity? | | Timeline | MVP date, reversible experiments OK? |

On interviews: spend the first two minutes on questions—interviewers often withhold constraints until you ask.

Common pitfalls: assuming greenfield; ignoring mobile or a11y; designing for infinite scale without need; skipping budget or staffing reality.

The trade-off is fewer minutes drawing boxes versus designs that actually fit the organization.

Checklist:

• Ask before deep architecture.
• Cover scale, latency, and consistency.
• Surface security and compliance early.
• Confirm timeline and reversibility expectations.