Workflow Orchestration Patterns FAQs

Question 1

What is the main difference between a Workflow and an Activity in Temporal?

Accepted Answer

Workflows handle orchestration logic and must be deterministic to allow for replaying state, while Activities handle external interactions like API calls, database writes, and other non-deterministic tasks.

Question 2

How do I handle long-running tasks that might stall?

Accepted Answer

Use Activity Heartbeats to periodically report progress to the Temporal server. This allows the system to detect if a worker has crashed or stalled and trigger a retry based on the last recorded heartbeat.

Question 3

Why is determinism strictly required for workflow code?

Accepted Answer

Temporal ensures durability by replaying workflow code against an event history; if the code produces different results on replay (due to random numbers or external calls), the system cannot restore its state.

Question 4

When should I use the Saga pattern?

Accepted Answer

Use the Saga pattern for distributed transactions requiring all-or-nothing semantics across multiple microservices, where each step has a corresponding compensation action to roll back changes on failure.

Workflow Orchestration Patterns

About

Key Features

Use Cases

Workflow Orchestration Patterns

About

Key Features

Use Cases