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Apache Kafka Demystified: Breaking Down the Basics

Apache Kafka is essential for organizations of all sizes to work with real-time data and be competitive. It is loved by developers, QA teams, and architects, and sometimes hated because of its complexity. Kafka enables efficient data exchange between teams at scale through its distributed streaming platform and extensive tooling, forming the backbone of many products and data systems. We'll explore why Apache Kafka is both powerful and simple yet complicated. We'll look at its key features like topics, partitions, and consumer groups using Conduktor to show how it operates and why it's designed like this. We'll also create stream processing applications to showcase its real-time capabilities and how it connects with traditional systems like databases. Additionally, we'll highlight some common issues in Kafka-based applications, typical of distributed systems, and how to tackle them.