Automated Continuous Kafka Replication to Azure SQL Database

Always-on applications rely on automatic failover capabilities and real-time data access. CData Sync integrates live Kafka data into your Azure SQL Database instance, allowing you to consolidate all of your data into a single location for archiving, reporting, analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence and more.

Configure Azure SQL Database as a Replication Destination

Using CData Sync, you can replicate Kafka data to Azure SQL Database. To add a replication destination, navigate to the Connections tab.

1. Click Add Connection. 👁 Add a new connection.
   
2. Select the Destinations tab and locate the Azure SQL Database connector. 👁 Configure a Destination connection to Azure SQL Database.
   
3. Click the Configure Connection icon at the end of that row to open the New Connection page. If the Configure Connection icon is not available, click the Download Connector icon to install the Azure SQL Database connector. For more information about installing new connectors, see Connections in the Help documentation.
4. To connect to Azure SQL database, set the following connection properties:
   • Connection Name: Enter a connection name of your choice for the Azure SQL database connection.
   • Server: Enter the host name or IP of the server that hosts the Azure SQL database.
   • Port: Enter the port number of the server that hosts the Azure SQL database. The default port value is 1433
   • Database: Enter the name of the database.
   • Auth Scheme: Select the authentication scheme. The default auth scheme is SqlPassword.
   • User: Enter the user ID provided for authentication with the Azure SQL database.
   • Password: Enter the password provided for authentication with the Azure SQL database.
👁 Enter the connection details.

5. Once connected, click Create & Test to create, test and save the connection.

You are now connected to Azure SQL database and can use it as both a source and a destination.

NOTE: You can use the Label feature to add a label for a source or a destination.

👁 Add a label.

In this article, we will demonstrate how to load Kafka data into Azure SQL database and utilize it as a destination.

Configure the Kafka Connection

You can configure a connection to Kafka from the Connections tab. To add a connection to your Kafka account, navigate to the Connections tab.

1. Click Add Connection.
2. Select a source (Kafka).
3. Configure the connection properties.
   
   

   Set BootstrapServers and the Topic properties to specify the address of your Apache Kafka server, as well as the topic you would like to interact with.

   Authorization Mechanisms

   • SASL Plain: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Plain'.
   • SASL SSL: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Scram'. UseSSL should be set to true.
   • SSL: The SSLCert and SSLCertPassword properties should be specified. UseSSL should be set to true.
   • Kerberos: The User and Password properties should be specified. AuthScheme should be set to 'Kerberos'.

   You may be required to trust the server certificate. In such cases, specify the TrustStorePath and the TrustStorePassword if necessary.

   👁 Configuring a Source connection (Salesforce is shown).
   
4. Click Connect to Kafka to ensure that the connection is configured properly.
5. Click Save & Test to save the changes.

Configure Replication Queries

CData Sync enables you to control replication with a point-and-click interface and with SQL queries. For each replication you wish to configure, navigate to the Jobs tab and click Add Job. Select the Source and Destination for your replication.

👁 Select Source and Destination connections for the replication.

Replicate Entire Tables

To replicate an entire table, navigate to the Task tab in the Job, click Add Tasks, choose the table(s) from the list of Kafka tables you wish to replicate into Azure SQL database, and click Add Tasks again.

👁 Choose entire tables to replicate (Salesforce is shown).

Customize Your Replication

You can use the Columns and Query tabs of a task to customize your replication. The Columns tab allows you to specify which columns to replicate, rename the columns at the destination, and even perform operations on the source data before replicating. The Query tab allows you to add filters, grouping, and sorting to the replication with the help of SQL queries. 👁 Configure a replication Transform.

Schedule Your Replication

Select the Overview tab in the Job, and click Configure under Schedule. You can schedule a job to run automatically by configuring it to run at specified intervals, ranging from once every 10 minutes to once every month.

👁 Schedule your job to run automatically.

Once you have configured the replication job, click Save Changes. You can configure any number of jobs to manage the replication of your Kafka data to Azure SQL database.

Run the Replication Job

Once all the required configurations are made for the job, select the Kafka table you wish to replicate and click Run. After the replication completes successfully, a notification appears, showing the time taken to run the job and the number of rows replicated.

👁 Run the job.

Free Trial & More Information

Now that you have seen how to replicate Kafka data into Azure SQL Database, visit our CData Sync page to explore more about CData Sync and download a free 30-day trial. Start consolidating your enterprise data today!

As always, our world-class Support Team is ready to answer any questions you may have.