Transforming How We Run Kafka at Honeycomb

Honeycomb recently completed a significant Kafka migration, transitioning from a self-hosted Confluent Platform and ZooKeeper to open-source Apache Kafka 4.1.1 in KRaft mode on AWS EKS, driven by the need for technical capability and sustainability, particularly for Honeycomb Private Cloud installations. The migration was meticulously planned, emphasizing lessons learned from past incidents, ensuring rollback safety, and maintaining data integrity and continuity, which were critical due to the complex data processing requirements managed by Kafka at Honeycomb. The project highlighted the importance of cross-team collaboration, building on institutional knowledge, and fostering team competence and confidence through detailed documentation and iterative learning from each migration phase. By designing a generalized and repeatable migration process, Honeycomb not only ensured the project’s success but also empowered their team, enabling them to manage future migrations with increased autonomy and expertise. Despite the challenges, the migration served as a testament to the team’s ability to tackle complex projects and the significance of clear communication and robust planning in achieving organizational goals.

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