Apache Kafka is an open-source distributed streaming platform that was developed by the Apache Software Foundation. It is used for building real-time data pipelines and streaming applications that can handle massive amounts of data and process it in near-real-time.
At its core, Kafka is a distributed publish-subscribe messaging system that enables applications to send and receive data streams or messages in real-time. It can handle millions of messages per second and provides durable storage of messages, allowing them to be processed by multiple applications or services.
Some of the key features of Kafka include:
– Horizontal scalability: Kafka can be scaled horizontally across multiple servers, making it easy to handle large volumes of data and traffic.
– Fault-tolerant: Kafka provides built-in replication and fault-tolerance, ensuring that data is not lost even in the event of hardware failures.
– Low-latency processing: Kafka is designed to process data in near real-time, making it ideal for streaming applications and real-time analytics.
– Flexibility: Kafka is a highly flexible platform that can integrate with a wide range of tools and technologies, including Hadoop, Spark, and other big data processing frameworks.
Kafka is used for a wide range of use cases, including real-time analytics, log aggregation, event sourcing, and messaging systems. It is particularly well-suited for building data pipelines and streaming applications that need to handle large volumes of data in real-time. Its flexibility and scalability make it a popular choice for companies of all sizes, from small startups to large enterprises.