I have have a couple of things published on Web App Scaling in the recent past. Here is a list:

1. A Quick Primer On Sharding For Ruby On Rails: I discuss application sharding techniques at a very high level.
2. Masters Interview at New Relic: I talk about all kinds of scaling concepts.
3. Filesystem Sharding Tactics and Processes: A look at how to shard filesystems. Many of the ideas can be used for sharding just about anything.

For those that do not know. I’d like to take a second and define sharding – even though I did not invent the term. Sharding is taking a system and breaking it up into smaller pieces, each with their own dedicated resources, to improve performance. It’s that simple.

Anyways, enjoy!