Hi, guys. I have a question: Do network issues have the potential to corrupt data on ZooKeeper or brokers?
The recent shift from monolithic to distributed computing has been driven by various factors, including the need for increased computational power, enhanced reliability, fault tolerance, and resource sharing.
Distributed computing, as the name suggests, operates across a network, which serves as a communication hub. However, this network can be prone to instability. For instance, although scaling and redundancy contribute to resilience, a distributed system must be meticulously designed to manage network issues effectively.
Generally, the likelihood of a distributed system failing due to a critical error is significantly lower compared to that of a monolithic system. However, network issues can still disrupt the functioning of distributed computing, potentially leading to data corruption, though this is quite rare.
Hardware issues are more probable, but a well-designed, resilient distributed system, such as Kafka, is equipped to withstand even these unlikely occurrences.
I don’t think that network issues would corrupt data. It would brings things to a halt for sure.
If there is a possiblity of data corruption please illustrate the same
Network problems can cause data corruption in distributed systems such as Kafka through indirect means.
Delays in the network can interfere with distributed processes like leader election, In-Sync Replica (ISR) management, replication, offset handling, and consumer group rebalancing.
Such disruptions may result in data corruption, primarily involving out-of-order messages and duplicates, rather than physical disk failures.
These issues can ultimately result in irrecoverable errors within Kafka.