Converging Paramount EPG Architectures with the Help of GraphQL: Journey, Challenges and Solutions

Giacomo SimmiParamount, Software Architect

Satish ChitnisParamount / Pluto TV, Principal Architect- Infrastructure

Paramount is a group of companies including Network Streaming, Paramount+, PlutoTV. Each of these companies has its own distinct tech stack and architecture. One of the goals of the Architectural Team is to simplify the architecture of the entire group by converging and merging the solutions while avoiding a big-bang approach that would have a significant impact on the business. After some investigations, the GraphQL Federated Architecture emerged as a strong candidate to initiate this process using a top-down approach, starting with the Paramount EPG services. In this session, we will describe: - The design of each intermediate EPG convergent architecture: we will outline the necessary steps to reach the final solution using a top-down and phased approach. - The challenges we faced: this includes choosing between code-first and schema-first approaches, modeling the data, addressing performance issues, deploying each subgraph to different infrastructures, and organizing subgraph teams, roles, and responsibilities. - Solutions we tried: we explored various tools and frameworks, such as Apollo and WunderGraph, to address these challenges.