> Markdown version of [/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1696-fault-tolerance-and](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1696-fault-tolerance-and). Every page supports `.md` or `Accept: text/markdown`. Links point to the HTML versions so they work for humans too. Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Fault Tolerance and Consistency at Scale: Harnessing the Power of Distributed SQL Databases - **Event:** World Congress 2026 North America ## Description Distributed SQL Databases are a powerful new data management technology that addresses modern applications’ need for scalability, availability, geographic distribution, and low response time – with the power of SQL and strong consistency. However, distributed databases bring their own challenges. For example, the familiar trade-offs between consistency, high availability, and partition tolerance still exist. Remote data access will still incur speed-of-light network delays. This talk will describe the inner workings of distributed databases and how to design applications to best exploit their power. Using Oracle and other distributed databases as examples, we will explore the capabilities and unique application challenges posed by distributed databases. This talk will address design patterns that empower applications to handle network latency and consistency in the presence of real-world networks that can and do fail. ## Speaker ### [Wei Hu](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/@wei-hu) Senior Vice President of Research and Development ## Related talks at this congress - [Databases in the Agent Era](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1678-databases-in-the) — Monica Sarbu - [Boring Failover: Predictable Region Recovery Across 5,000 Microservices](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1698-boring-failover) — Garvit Kataria, Sahil Sabharwal - [Testing React Backends Like a Pro: Mocking Databases with SQLite](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1723-testing-react) — David Morris - [It passed auth, then production caught fire](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1703-it-passed-auth-then) — Alex Olivier ## Watch remotely Can’t make it to San José? Watch this session live with Pro. You also get: - All full videos, bookmarks, and playlists - World Congress livestreams [See pricing](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/pricing) ## Links - [Get tickets](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/world-congress-north-america/tickets)