Ingest data from Kafka

This topic describes how to connect RisingWave to a Kafka broker that you want to receive data from, and how to specify data formats, schemas, and security (encryption and authentication) settings.

A source is a resource that RisingWave can read data from. You can create a source in RisingWave using the CREATE SOURCE command. When creating a source, you can choose to persist the data from the source in RisingWave by using the CREATE TABLE command and specifying the connection settings and data format.

Regardless of whether the data is persisted in RisingWave, you can create materialized views to perform analysis or data transformations.

RisingWave supports exactly-once semantics by reading transactional messages only when the associated transaction has been committed. This is the set behavior for RisingWave and not configurable.

Guided setup

RisingWave Cloud provides an intuitive guided setup for creating a Kafka source. For more information, see Create a source using guided setup in the RisingWave Cloud documentation.

Syntax

CREATE {TABLE | SOURCE} [ IF NOT EXISTS ] source_name 
[ schema_definition ]
[INCLUDE { header | key | offset | partition | timestamp } [AS <column_name>]]
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   connector_parameter='value', ...
)
FORMAT data_format ENCODE data_encode (
   message = 'message',
   schema.location = 'location' | schema.registry = 'schema_registry_url'
);

schema_definition:

(
   column_name data_type [ PRIMARY KEY ], ...
   [ PRIMARY KEY ( column_name, ... ) ]
)

info

For Avro and Protobuf data, do not specify schema_definition in the CREATE SOURCE statement.

note

RisingWave performs primary key constraint checks on tables but not on sources. If you need the checks to be performed, please create a table.

For tables with primary key constraints, if a new data record with an existing key comes in, the new record will overwrite the existing record.

Connector parameters

Field	Notes
topic	Required. Address of the Kafka topic. One source can only correspond to one topic.
properties.bootstrap.server	Required. Address of the Kafka broker. Format: `'ip:port,ip:port'`.
scan.startup.mode	Optional. The offset mode that RisingWave will use to consume data. The two supported modes are `earliest` (earliest offset) and `latest` (latest offset). If not specified, the default value `earliest` will be used.
scan.startup.timestamp.millis	Optional. RisingWave will start to consume data from the specified UNIX timestamp (milliseconds). If this field is specified, the value for `scan.startup.mode` will be ignored.
properties.sync.call.timeout	Optional. Specify the timeout. By default, the timeout is 5 seconds.
properties.client.id	Optional. Client ID associated with the Kafka client.

Other parameters

Field	Notes
data_format	Data format. Supported formats: `DEBEZIUM`, `MAXWELL`, `CANAL`, `UPSERT`, `PLAIN`.
data_encode	Data encode. Supported encodes: `JSON`, `AVRO`, `PROTOBUF`, `CSV`.
message	Message name of the main Message in schema definition. Required for Protobuf.
location	Web location of the schema file in `http://...`, `https://...`, or `S3://...` format. This option is not supported for Avro data. For Protobuf data, you must specify either a schema location or a schema registry but not both.
schema.registry	Confluent Schema Registry URL. Example: `http://127.0.0.1:8081`. For Avro data, you must specify a Confluent Schema Registry. For Protobuf data, you must specify either a schema location or a Confluent Schema Registry but not both.
schema.registry.username	Conditional. User name for the schema registry. It must be specified with `schema.registry.password`.
schema.registry.password	Conditional. Password for the schema registry. It must be specified with `schema.registry.username`.
schema.registry.name.strategy	Optional. Accepts `topic_name_strategy` (default), `record_name_strategy`, `topic_record_name_strategy`. If it is set to either `record_name_strategy` or `topic_record_name_strategy`, the `message` parameter must also be set. It can only be specified with schema.registry.
access_key	Required if loading descriptors from S3. The access key ID of AWS.
secret_key	Required if loading descriptors from S3. The secret access key of AWS.
region	Required if loading descriptors from S3. The AWS service region.
arn	Optional. The Amazon Resource Name (ARN) of the role to assume.
external_id	Optional. The external id used to authorize access to third-party resources.

Additional Kafka parameters

When creating a source in RisingWave, you can specify the following Kafka parameters. To set the parameter, add the RisingWave equivalent of the Kafka parameter under the WITH options. For an example of the usage of these parameters, see the JSON example. For additional details on these parameters, see the Configuration properties.

Kafka parameter name	RisingWave parameter name	Type
enable.auto.commit	properties.enable.auto.commit	boolean
enable.ssl.certificate.verification	properties.enable.ssl.certificate.verification	bool
fetch.max.bytes	properties.fetch.max.bytes	int
fetch.queue.backoff.ms	properties.fetch.queue.backoff.ms	int
fetch.wait.max.ms	properties.fetch.wait.max.ms	int
message.max.bytes	properties.message.max.bytes	int
queued.max.messages.kbytes	properties.queued.max.messages.kbytes	int
queued.min.messages	properties.queued.min.messages	int
receive.message.max.bytes	properties.receive.message.max.bytes	int
ssl.endpoint.identification.algorithm	properties.ssl.endpoint.identification.algorithm	str

note

Set properties.ssl.endpoint.identification.algorithm to none to bypass the verification of CA certificates and resolve SSL handshake failure. This parameter can be set to either https or none. By default, it is https.

Examples

Here are examples of connecting RisingWave to a Kafka broker to read data from individual topics.

note

RisingWave supports reading messages that have been compressed by zstd. Additional configurations are not required.

CREATE SOURCE IF NOT EXISTS source_abc 
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='demo_topic',
   properties.bootstrap.server='172.10.1.1:9090,172.10.1.2:9090',
   scan.startup.mode='latest',
   scan.startup.timestamp.millis='140000000'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE AVRO (
   message = 'message_name',
   schema.registry = 'http://127.0.0.1:8081'
);

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS source_abc 
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9092',
   topic='test_topic'
)
FORMAT UPSERT ENCODE AVRO (
   schema.registry = 'http://127.0.0.1:8081',
   schema.registry.username='your_schema_registry_username',
   schema.registry.password='your_schema_registry_password'
);

CREATE SOURCE IF NOT EXISTS source_abc (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='demo_topic',
   properties.bootstrap.server='172.10.1.1:9090,172.10.1.2:9090',
   scan.startup.mode='latest',
   scan.startup.timestamp.millis='140000000'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

The additional Kafka parameters queued.min.messages and queued.max.messages.kbytes are specified with properties.queued.min.messages and properties.queued.max.messages.kbytes, respectively, when creating the source.

CREATE SOURCE s1 (v1 int, v2 varchar) with (
  connector = 'kafka',
  topic = 'kafka_1_partition_topic',
  properties.bootstrap.server = 'message_queue:29092',
  scan.startup.mode = 'earliest',
  properties.queued.min.messages = 10000,
  properties.queued.max.messages.kbytes = 65536
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS source_abc (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9092',
   topic='t1'
) FORMAT UPSERT ENCODE JSON;

CREATE SOURCE IF NOT EXISTS source_abc 
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='demo_topic',
   properties.bootstrap.server='172.10.1.1:9090,172.10.1.2:9090',
   scan.startup.mode='latest',
   scan.startup.timestamp.millis='140000000'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE PROTOBUF (
   message = 'package.message_name',
   access_key = 'your_access_key',
   secret_key = 'your secret_key',
   location = 'https://demo_bucket_name.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/demo.proto'
);

CREATE TABLE s0 (v1 int, v2 varchar)
WITH (
   connector = 'kafka',
   topic = 'kafka_csv_topic',
   properties.bootstrap.server = '127.0.0.1:29092',
   scan.startup.mode = 'earliest'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE CSV (
   without_header = 'true',
   delimiter = ','
);

CSV header is not supported when creating a table with Kafka connector. Add the without_header option to the encode parameters.
The delimiter option specifies the delimiter character used in the CSV data. Set delimiter = E'\t' for tab-delimited data.

CREATE SOURCE t1 (id bytea)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='topic1',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9093',
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE BYTES;

Query Kafka timestamp

For each Kafka source created, the virtual column, _rw_kafka_timestamp, will also exist. This column includes the timestamp of the Kafka message.

You can include this column in your views or materialized views to display the Kafka timestamp. Here is an example.

CREATE MATERIALIZED VIEW v1 AS
SELECT _rw_kafka_timestamp, col1
FROM source_name;

If directly querying from the source, you can use _rw_kafka_timestamp to filter messages sent within a specific time period. For example, the following query only selects messages sent in the past 10 minutes.

SELECT * FROM source_name
WHERE _rw_kafka_timestamp > now() - interval '10 minute';

Read schemas from locations

RisingWave supports reading schemas from a Web location in http://..., https://..., or S3://... format, or a Confluent Schema Registry for Kafka data in Protobuf format. For Avro, only Confluent Schema Registry is supported for reading schemas.

For Protobuf, if a schema location is specified, the schema file must be a FileDescriptorSet, which can be compiled from a .proto file with a command like this:

protoc -I=$include_path --include_imports --descriptor_set_out=schema.pb schema.proto

To specify a schema location, add this clause to a CREATE SOURCE statement.

ENCODE data_encode (
   schema.location = 'location'
)

If a primary key also needs to be defined, use the table constraint syntax.

CREATE TABLE table1 (PRIMARY KEY(id)) 

Read schemas from Schema Registry

Confluent and Karapace Schema Registry provide a serving layer for your metadata. They provide a RESTful interface for storing and retrieving your schemas.

RisingWave supports reading schemas from a Schema Registry. The latest schema will be retrieved from the specified Schema Registry using the TopicNameStrategy strategy when the CREATE SOURCE statement is issued. Then the schema parser in RisingWave will automatically determine the columns and data types to use in the source.

To specify the Schema Registry, add this clause to a CREATE SOURCE statement.

ENCODE data_encode (
   schema.registry = 'schema_registry_url'
)

To learn more about Confluent Schema Registry and how to set up a Schema Registry, refer to the Confluent Schema Registry documentation.

To learn more about Karapace Schema Registry and how to get started, see Get started with Karapace.

If a primary key also needs to be defined, use the table constraint syntax.

CREATE TABLE table1 (PRIMARY KEY(id)) 

Schema evolution

Based on the compatibility type that is configured for the schema registry, some changes are allowed without changing the schema to a different version. In this case, RisingWave will continue using the original schema definition. To use a newer version of the writer schema in RisingWave, you need to drop and recreate the source.

To learn about compatibility types for Schema Registry and the changes allowed, see Compatibility Types.

Create source with VPC connection

If your Kafka source service is located in a different VPC from RisingWave, use AWS PrivateLink to establish a secure and direct connection. For details on how to set up an AWS PrivateLink connection, see Create an AWS PrivateLink connection.

To create a Kafka source with a VPC connection, in the WITH section of your CREATE SOURCE or CREATE TABLE statement, specify the following parameters.

Parameter	Notes
`privatelink.targets`	The PrivateLink targets that correspond to the Kafka brokers. The targets should be in JSON format. Note that each target listed corresponds to each broker specified in the `properties.bootstrap.server` field. If the order is incorrect, there will be connectivity issues.
`privatelink.endpoint`	The DNS name of the VPC endpoint. If you're using RisingWave Cloud, you can find the auto-generated endpoint after you created a connection. See details in Create a VPC connection.
`connection.name`	The name of the connection. This parameter should only be included if you are using a connection created with the `CREATE CONNECTION` statement. Omit this parameter if you have provisioned a VPC endpoint using `privatelink.endpoint` (recommended).

Here is an example of creating a Kafka source using a PrivateLink connection. Notice that {"port": 9094} corresponds to the broker broker1-endpoint, {"port": 9095} corresponds to the broker broker2-endpoint, and {"port": 9096} corresponds to the broker broker3-endpoint.

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS crypto_source (
  product_id VARCHAR,
  price NUMERIC,
  open_24h NUMERIC,
  volume_24h NUMERIC,
  low_24h NUMERIC,
  high_24h NUMERIC,
  volume_30d NUMERIC,
  best_bid  NUMERIC,
  best_ask  NUMERIC,
  side VARCHAR,
  time timestamp,
  trade_id bigint,
)
WITH (
  connector='kafka',
  topic='crypto',
  privatelink.endpoint='10.148.0.4',
  privatelink.targets='[{"port": 9094}, {"port": 9095}, {"port": 9096}]',
  properties.bootstrap.server='broker1-endpoint,broker2-endpoint,broker3-endpoint',
  scan.startup.mode='latest'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

TLS/SSL encryption and SASL authentication

RisingWave can read Kafka data that is encrypted with Transport Layer Security (TLS) and/or authenticated with SASL.

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) was the predecessor of Transport Layer Security (TLS), and has been deprecated since June 2015. For historical reasons, SSL is used in configuration and code instead of TLS.

Simple Authentication and Security Layer (SASL) is a framework for authentication and data security in Internet protocols.

RisingWave supports these SASL authentication mechanisms:

SASL/PLAIN
SASL/SCRAM

SSL encryption can be used concurrently with SASL authentication mechanisms.

To learn about how to enable SSL encryption and SASL authentication in Kafka, including how to generate the keys and certificates, see the Security Tutorial from Confluent.

You need to specify encryption and authentication parameters in the WITH section of a CREATE SOURCE statement.

SSL without SASL

To read data encrypted with SSL without SASL authentication, specify these parameters in the WITH section of your CREATE SOURCE statement.

Parameter	Notes
`properties.security.protocol`	Set to `SSL`.
`properties.ssl.ca.location`
`properties.ssl.certificate.location`
`properties.ssl.key.location`
`properties.ssl.key.password`

note

For the definitions of the parameters, see the librdkafka properties list. Note that the parameters in the list assumes all parameters start with properties. and therefore do not include this prefix.

Here is an example of creating a table encrypted with SSL without using SASL authentication.

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS table_1 (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='quickstart-events',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9093',
   scan.startup.mode='earliest',
   properties.security.protocol='SSL',
   properties.ssl.ca.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/ca-cert',
   properties.ssl.certificate.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/client_risingwave_client.pem',
   properties.ssl.key.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/client_risingwave_client.key',
   properties.ssl.key.password='abcdefgh'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

`SASL/PLAIN`

Parameter	Notes
`properties.security.protocol`	For SASL/PLAIN without SSL, set to `SASL_PLAINTEXT`. For SASL/PLAIN with SSL, set to `SASL_SSL`.
`properties.sasl.mechanism`	Set to `PLAIN`.
`properties.sasl.username`
`properties.sasl.password`

note

For SASL/PLAIN with SSL, you need to include these SSL parameters:

properties.ssl.ca.location
properties.ssl.certificate.location
properties.ssl.key.location
properties.ssl.key.password

Here is an example of creating a source authenticated with SASL/PLAIN without SSL encryption.

CREATE SOURCE IF NOT EXISTS source_2 (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='quickstart-events',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9093',
   scan.startup.mode='earliest',
   properties.sasl.mechanism='PLAIN',
   properties.security.protocol='SASL_PLAINTEXT',
   properties.sasl.username='admin',
   properties.sasl.password='admin-secret'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

This is an example of creating a source authenticated with SASL/PLAIN with SSL encryption.

CREATE SOURCE IF NOT EXISTS source_3 (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='quickstart-events',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9093',
   scan.startup.mode='earliest',
   properties.sasl.mechanism='PLAIN',
   properties.security.protocol='SASL_SSL',
   properties.sasl.username='admin',
   properties.sasl.password='admin-secret',
   properties.ssl.ca.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/ca-cert',
   properties.ssl.certificate.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/client_risingwave_client.pem',
   properties.ssl.key.location='/home/ubuntu/kafka/secrets/client_risingwave_client.key',
   properties.ssl.key.password='abcdefgh'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

`SASL/SCRAM`

Parameter	Notes
`properties.security.protocol`	For SASL/SCRAM without SSL, set to `SASL_PLAINTEXT`. For SASL/SCRAM with SSL, set to `SASL_SSL`.
`properties.sasl.mechanism`	Set to `SCRAM-SHA-256` or `SCRAM-SHA-512` depending on the encryption method used.
`properties.sasl.username`
`properties.sasl.password`

note

For SASL/SCRAM with SSL, you also need to include these SSL parameters:

properties.ssl.ca.location
properties.ssl.certificate.location
properties.ssl.key.location
properties.ssl.key.password

Here is an example of creating a table authenticated with SASL/SCRAM without SSL encryption.

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS table_4 (
   column1 varchar,
   column2 integer,
)
WITH (
   connector='kafka',
   topic='quickstart-events',
   properties.bootstrap.server='localhost:9093',
   scan.startup.mode='earliest',
   properties.sasl.mechanism='SCRAM-SHA-256',
   properties.security.protocol='SASL_PLAINTEXT',
   properties.sasl.username='admin',
   properties.sasl.password='admin-secret'
) FORMAT PLAIN ENCODE JSON;

Why does RisingWave not accept Kafka consumer group ID

Syntax​

Connector parameters​

Other parameters​

Additional Kafka parameters​

Examples​

Query Kafka timestamp​

Read schemas from locations​

Read schemas from Schema Registry​

Schema evolution​

Create source with VPC connection​

TLS/SSL encryption and SASL authentication​

SSL without SASL​

SASL/PLAIN​

SASL/SCRAM​

Related topics​

Was this page helpful?

Syntax

Connector parameters

Other parameters

Additional Kafka parameters

Examples

Query Kafka timestamp

Read schemas from locations

Read schemas from Schema Registry

Schema evolution

Create source with VPC connection

TLS/SSL encryption and SASL authentication

SSL without SASL

`SASL/PLAIN`

`SASL/SCRAM`

Related topics