Case study: Mateu in a microservices system

The problem

In a typical microservices architecture, teams often end up with:

• a separate frontend application
• duplicated models between frontend and backend
• custom APIs for every screen
• complex synchronization between layers

This leads to slower development and higher maintenance costs.

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The approach

In this project, Mateu is used to define UI directly inside backend services.

Each service:

• owns its domain logic
• exposes its own UI routes
• defines its own screens using Mateu

Example:

@UI("/_users")
@Title("Users")
public class UsersHome {

    @Menu
    UsersMenu users;
}

Each service defines its own menus and CRUD flows:

public class UsersMenu {

    @Menu
    UsersCrud users;

    @Menu
    RolesCrud roles;

    @Menu
    PermissionsCrud permissions;
}

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Architecture

• backend services communicate via gRPC
• each service exposes UI through Mateu
• frontend acts as a renderer, not as an application layer
• UI is composed from multiple services

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What changed

Instead of:

• backend + frontend + API

You now have:

• backend + UI definition (in the same place)

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Benefits

Less duplication

No need to redefine models in multiple layers.

Clear ownership

Each service owns:

• data
• logic
• UI

Simpler architecture

No need for:

• custom APIs per screen
• frontend state synchronization

Better fit for microservices

UI aligns with service boundaries.

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When this works best

• internal tools
• CRUD-heavy systems
• enterprise apps
• distributed architectures

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Summary

Mateu allows you to keep UI definition close to the backend that owns the behavior.

This reduces complexity and makes microservice-based systems easier to build and evolve.

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👉 Try the demo: https://vaadin.mateu.io/fluent/use-cases/rra