Data definition

This section covers how you create the structures that store your events. ksqlDB abstracts events as rows with columns and stores them in streams and tables.

Rows and columns

Streams and tables help you model collections of events that accrete over time. Both are represented as a series of rows and columns with a schema, much like a relational database table. Rows represent individual events. Columns represent the attributes of those events.

Each column has a data type. The data type limits the span of permissible values that you can assign. For example, if a column is declared as type INT, it can't be assigned the value of string 'foo'.

In contrast to relational database tables, the columns of a row in ksqlDB are divided into key and value columns. The key columns control which partition a row resides in. The value columns, by convention, store the main data of interest. Controlling the key columns is useful for manipulating the underlying data locality, and enables you to integrate with the wider Kafka ecosystem, which uses the same key/value data model. By default, a column is a value column. Marking a column as a (PRIMARY) KEY makes it a key column.

Internally, each row is backed by a Kafka record. In Kafka, the key and value parts of a record are serialized independently. ksqlDB enables you to exercise this same flexibility and builds on the semantics of Kafka records, rather than hiding them.

There is no theoretical limit on the number of columns in a stream or table. In practice, the limit is determined by the maximum message size that Kafka can store and the resources dedicated to ksqlDB.

Streams

A stream is a partitioned, immutable, append-only collection that represents a series of historical facts. For example, the rows of a stream could model a sequence of financial transactions, like "Alice sent $100 to Bob", followed by "Charlie sent $50 to Bob".

Once a row is inserted into a stream, it can never change. New rows can be appended at the end of the stream, but existing rows can never be updated or deleted.

Each row is stored in a particular partition. Every row, implicitly or explicitly, has a key that represents its identity. All rows with the same key reside in the same partition.

To create a stream, use the CREATE STREAM command. The following example statement specifies a name for the new stream, the names of the columns, and the data type of each column.

CREATE STREAM s1 (
    k VARCHAR KEY,
    v1 INT,
    v2 VARCHAR
) WITH (
    kafka_topic = 's1',
    partitions = 3,
    value_format = 'json'
);

This creates a new stream named s1 with three columns: k, v1, and v2. The column k is designated as the key of this stream, which controls the partition that each row is stored in. When the data is stored, the value portion of each row's underlying Kafka record is serialized in the JSON format.

Under the hood, each stream corresponds to a Kafka topic with a registered schema. If the backing topic for a stream doesn't exist when you declare it, ksqlDB creates it on your behalf, as shown in the previous example statement.

You can also declare a stream on top of an existing topic. When you do that, ksqlDB simply registers its associated schema. If topic s2 already exists, the following statement register a new stream over it:

CREATE STREAM s2 (
    k1 VARCHAR KEY,
    v1 VARCHAR
) WITH (
    kafka_topic = 's2',
    value_format = 'json'
);

Tip

When you create a stream on an existing topic, you don't need to declare the number of partitions for the topic. ksqlDB infers the partition count from the existing topic.

Tables

A table is a mutable, partitioned collection that models change over time. In contrast with a stream, which represents a historical sequence of events, a table represents what is true as of "now". For example, you might use a table to model the locations where someone has lived as a stream: first Miami, then New York, then London, and so forth.

Tables work by leveraging the keys of each row. If a sequence of rows shares a key, the last row for a given key represents the most up-to-date information for that key's identity. A background process periodically runs and deletes all but the newest rows for each key.

Syntactically, declaring a table is similar to declaring a stream. The following example statement declares a current_location table that has a key field named person.

CREATE TABLE current_location (
    person VARCHAR PRIMARY KEY,
    location VARCHAR
) WITH (
    kafka_topic = 'current_location',
    partitions = 3,
    value_format = 'json'
);

As with a stream, you can declare a table directly on top of an existing Kafka topic by omitting the number of partitions in the WITH clause.

Keys

You can mark a column with the KEY keyword to indicate that it's a key column. Key columns constitute the key portion of the row's underlying Kafka record. Only streams can mark columns as keys, and it's optional for them to do do. Tables must use the PRIMARY KEY constraint instead.

In the following example statement, k1's data is stored in the key portion of the row, and v1's data is stored in the value.

CREATE STREAM s3 (
    k1 VARCHAR KEY,
    v1 VARCHAR
) WITH (
    kafka_topic = 's3',
    value_format = 'json'
);

The ability to declare key columns explicitly is especially useful when you're creating a stream over an existing topic. If ksqlDB can't infer what data is in the key of the underlying Kafka record, it must perform a repartition of the rows internally. If you're not sure what data is in the key or you simply don't need it, you can omit the KEY keyword.

Default values

If a column is declared in a schema, but no attribute is present in the underlying Kafka record, the value for the row's column is populated as null.

Pseudocolumns

A pseudocolumn is a column that's automatically populated by ksqlDB and contains meta-information that can be inferred about the row at creation time. By default, pseudocolumns aren't returned when selecting all columns with the star (*) special character. You must select them explicitly, as shown in the following example statement.

SELECT ROWTIME, * FROM s1 EMIT CHANGES;

The following table lists all pseudocolumns.

pseudocolumn	meaning
ROWTIME	Row timestamp, inferred from the underlying Kafka record if not overridden.

You can't create additional pseudocolumns beyond these.

Constraints

Although data types help limit the range of values that can be accepted by ksqlDB, sometimes it's useful to have more sophisticated restrictions. Constraints enable you to exercise this type of logic directly in your schema.

Primary key constraints

In a relational database, a primary key indicates that a column will be used as a unique identifier for all rows in a table. If you have a table that has a row with primary key 5, you can't insert another row whose primary key is also 5.

ksqlDB uses primary keys in a similar way, but there are a few differences, because ksqlDB is an event streaming database, not a relational database.

• Only tables can have primary keys. Streams do not support them.
• Adding multiple rows to a table with the same primary key doesn't cause the subsequent rows to be rejected.

The reason for both of these behaviors is the same: the purpose of tables is to model change of particular identities, but streams are used to accrete facts. When you insert multiple rows with the same primary key into a table, ksqlDB interprets these rows as changes to a single identity.

Primary keys can't be null, and they must be used in all declared tables. In the following example statement, id acts as the primary key for table users:

CREATE TABLE users (
    id BIGINT PRIMARY KEY
    name VARCHAR
  ) WITH (
    kafka_topic = 'users',
    partitions = 3,
    value_format = 'json'
  );

Not-null constraints

A not-null constraint designates that a column can't contain a null value. ksqlDB doesn't support this constraint, but you can track its progress in GitHub issue 4436.

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Last update: 2020-10-19