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Hands-on assignments

The hands-on assignments consist of programming exercises in Apache Flink and Apache Kafka. These assignments will familiarize you with basic operators and API constructs and prepare you for completing the final project.

Software requirements

You can develop and execute Flink applications on Linux, macOS, and Windows. However, UNIX-based setups have complete tooling support and are generally preferred by Flink developers. All assignments assume a UNIX-based setup. If you are a Windows user, you are advised to use Windows subsystem for Linux (WSL), Cygwin, or a Linux virtual machine to run Flink in a UNIX environment.

To setup and run Flink, you additionally need:

A Java 8.x installation. To develop Flink applications and use its DataStream API in Java or Scala you will need a Java JDK. A Java JRE is not sufficient!
Apache Maven 3.x. Flink provides Maven archetypes to bootstrap new projects.
An IDE for Java and/or Scala development. Common choices are IntelliJ IDEA, Eclipse, or Netbeans with appropriate plugins installed. We recommend using IntelliJ IDEA. You can follow these instructions to download and install it.

Even though Flink is a distributed data processing system, you will typically develop and run initial tests on your local machine. This makes development easier and simplifies cluster deployment, as you can run the exact same code in a cluster environment without making any changes.

Documentation is your friend

To get started with Apache Flink and Kafka, follow the steps in these quickstart tutorials:

Apache Flink DataStream API tutorial
Apache Kafka Quickstart (steps 1-6)

To successfully complete the assignments, always make sure to read the relevant documentation from the Apache Flink and Kafka websites: