Kafka

Basics of Kafka

1. What is Apache Kafka, and what are its primary use cases?
2. Explain the architecture of Kafka.
3. What are Kafka topics, and how do they work?
4. Describe Kafka’s data model.
5. What is a Kafka broker, and what is its role in the Kafka ecosystem?
6. How does Kafka ensure message durability?
7. What is a Kafka partition, and why is it important?
8. How does Kafka achieve high availability and fault tolerance?
9. What is a Kafka consumer group?
10. What are Kafka producers, and what is their role?

Kafka Configuration

11. What are the key configuration parameters for a Kafka broker?
12. How do you configure Kafka replication?
13. What is the role of zookeeper.connect in Kafka?
14. How do you configure message retention in Kafka?
15. What are acks in Kafka, and how do they impact message durability?
16. How do you configure Kafka’s log segment size and retention policies?
17. Explain how to set up Kafka security (SSL/TLS and SASL).
18. How do you configure Kafka for optimal performance?
19. What are some common Kafka tuning parameters?
20. How do you configure Kafka topics with custom partitions and replication factors?

Kafka Producers and Consumers

21. How does a Kafka producer ensure message delivery?
22. What is message batching in Kafka, and why is it used?
23. How do you handle message serialization and deserialization in Kafka?
24. Explain the concept of message keys in Kafka.
25. How does Kafka manage offsets for consumers?
26. What are Kafka’s delivery guarantees (e.g., at-most-once, at-least-once, exactly-once)?
27. How do you implement idempotent producers in Kafka?
28. What are Kafka’s strategies for load balancing across consumers?
29. How do you handle consumer failures and recoveries?
30. What is Kafka’s offset commit mechanism, and how does it work?

Kafka Streams and Connect

31. What is Kafka Streams, and what are its primary use cases?
32. How does Kafka Streams differ from traditional stream processing frameworks?
33. What is a Kafka Streams state store, and how is it used?
34. How do you handle stateful stream processing in Kafka Streams?
35. What is Kafka Connect, and how is it used for data integration?
36. Explain the role of Kafka Connectors in data ingestion and egress.
37. How do you manage and configure Kafka Connectors?
38. What are the differences between Kafka Connect and Kafka Streams?
39. How do you handle schema evolution in Kafka Connect?
40. What are some common use cases for Kafka Connect?

Kafka Performance and Scaling

41. How do you measure and monitor Kafka performance?
42. What are the common performance bottlenecks in Kafka?
43. How do you scale Kafka brokers horizontally?
44. What strategies can you use to optimize Kafka throughput?
45. How do you handle large volumes of data in Kafka?
46. What are some best practices for Kafka partition management?
47. How do you handle Kafka’s disk and network I/O for better performance?
48. What is the role of Kafka’s data compression, and how is it configured?
49. How do you optimize Kafka producer and consumer settings for performance?
50. What are the impacts of message size and frequency on Kafka performance?

Kafka Fault Tolerance and Recovery

51. How does Kafka handle broker failures?
52. What is a leader and a follower in Kafka, and how does leader election work?
53. How do you configure Kafka for disaster recovery?
54. What are Kafka’s strategies for data replication and recovery?
55. How do you manage and recover from data loss in Kafka?
56. What are Kafka’s mechanisms for ensuring message delivery in the event of failures?
57. How do you handle partition reassignment and balancing in Kafka?
58. What is Kafka’s log compaction feature, and how does it work?
59. How do you monitor Kafka’s replication lag?
60. How do you handle and mitigate issues related to under-replicated partitions?

Kafka Security

61. What are the key security features of Kafka?
62. How do you configure SSL/TLS for secure communication in Kafka?
63. Explain Kafka’s authentication mechanisms.
64. What is Kafka’s authorization model, and how do you implement it?
65. How do you secure data in transit and at rest in Kafka?
66. What are the common security practices for Kafka deployment?
67. How do you manage Kafka access control and permissions?
68. What are the implications of using Kerberos for Kafka security?
69. How do you handle secrets management in Kafka?
70. What are the potential security vulnerabilities in Kafka, and how can they be mitigated?

Kafka Monitoring and Troubleshooting

71. What are the key metrics to monitor in Kafka?
72. How do you use Kafka’s JMX metrics for monitoring?
73. What tools can be used for Kafka monitoring and alerting?
74. How do you troubleshoot Kafka producer and consumer issues?
75. What are some common Kafka errors, and how do you resolve them?
76. How do you diagnose and fix Kafka performance issues?
77. How do you handle Kafka’s disk space management?
78. What is Kafka’s role in log management, and how do you optimize it?
79. How do you use tools like Kafka Manager, Confluent Control Center, or Burrow for Kafka management?
80. What are some best practices for Kafka log management and retention?

Kafka Use Cases and Design Patterns

81. What are some common use cases for Apache Kafka in modern architectures?
82. How do you implement event sourcing using Kafka?
83. What is the role of Kafka in microservices architectures?
84. How do you use Kafka for real-time data streaming and analytics?
85. What is the role of Kafka in log aggregation?
86. How do you implement a pub/sub model using Kafka?
87. What are the benefits of using Kafka for data pipelines?
88. How do you handle data transformation and enrichment in Kafka?
89. What design patterns are commonly used with Kafka?
90. How do you implement exactly-once semantics in Kafka?

Kafka Integration and Ecosystem

91. How does Kafka integrate with other data processing systems like Hadoop or Spark?
92. What are some common Kafka clients, and how do they differ?
93. How do you integrate Kafka with databases or data warehouses?
94. What is the role of Confluent’s ecosystem in extending Kafka’s capabilities?
95. How do you use Kafka with cloud platforms (e.g., AWS MSK, Azure Event Hubs)?
96. What are the benefits of using Confluent Schema Registry with Kafka?
97. How do you handle data schema evolution with Kafka?
98. How does Kafka fit into a serverless architecture?
99. What is Kafka Streams’ role in the data ecosystem?
100. How do you use Kafka’s Kafka Streams API for real-time stream processing?