Co-locating Data and Application Code for a 4.5x Performance Gain

Modern web application architectures typically run each layer in its own process, like a NodeJS server and database both running in their own processes. They communicate via a network connection or localhost socket. This separation introduces protocol overheads, TCP stack latency, and data serialization/deserialization costs on every single query. Planck is designed around the concept of Zero-Distance Architecture that co-locates data and application code. It combines the database engine and a WebAssembly application runtime into a single, unified process. By running your application code directly inside the database process, database calls become direct in-memory function calls rather than network round-trips. This article provides a practical guide to getting started with Planck. We will look at the core toolchain, walk through setting up a self-contained local benchmark, compare its performance against a NodeJS, ExpressJS, MongoDB stack, and look at how to build more complex features. The Toolchain: Planck, planctl, and Workbench Running and managing a zero-distance app requires three main components. Planck itself is the core binary. It functions as both the storage engine (a WiscKey-style, LSM-tree-based engine) and the WebAssembly host. Instead of running a database in one process and your application server in another, you run a single Planck process. It loads your compiled WebAssembly application directly into its memory, running it in the same process space as the database. To manage this runtime, you use planctl. This is the command-line tool for developers. It handles the compilation of your code, packages it, and deploys it to the Planck host. It also allows you to perform database operations, like creating stores and defining indexes, export/import, backup/restore directly from your terminal. Finally, there is the Workbench. This is a web console that comes built into the platform. It provides a visual dashboard to monitor your applications, view databa