What is it

Runtime for managing distributed application state at scale.

Scalable and reliable runtime for durable function executions.

• Function Executions = Temporal Workflow Executions.

Guarantees durable execution of application code.

• Durable execution = Ability of a Workflow Execution to maintain its state and progress even in the face of failures, crashes, or server outages.

Two main parts:

• Workflows
• Activities

Workflow

Stateful function to orchestrate the application.

All variable and threads in a workflow are stored in the Temporal service.

When a server fails, the Temporal will continue exactly at the line of failure before the server crash.

You don't need queues or databases to track temporary state of the application.

Activity Functions

Encapsulates code that interacts with an unreliable external services.

You don't need to write retry logics when an external call or system fails.

Activities do not have states, but it has native retry logic and automatic timeouts.

Hierarchy

Workflows > Activities > Gateways

Platform

What is it

Consists of a Temporal Cluster and Worker Processes.

• Together these components create a runtime for Workflow Executions.

Temporal Cluster = supervising software Worker Processes = application code

Temporal Platform 
|-----------------------------------------------------|
|                                                     |
| |Workerprocess 1| Workerprocess 2| Workerprocess 3| |
|                                                     |
||---------------------------------------------------||
||Temporal Cluster                                   ||
||---------------------------------------------------||
|                                                     |
|-----------------------------------------------------|