System Design - Scalability: Sharding Part 1
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Questions and Answers

What is sharding, and how does it relate to horizontal partitioning?

Sharding is a form of horizontal partitioning, where rows of a table are distributed across multiple databases.

What is the primary goal of ongoing monitoring and maintenance in a sharded database?

To balance load and ensure optimal performance.

What is the purpose of choosing a shard key in a sharded database?

To select a column that evenly distributes the load.

What is the role of a hash function in hash-based sharding?

<p>To determine the shard based on the user_id.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What is the purpose of implementing shard mapping in a sharded database?

<p>To route queries to the appropriate shard based on the hashed user_id.</p> Signup and view all the answers

How is data insertion handled in a sharded database?

<p>By hashing the user_id to find the target shard and inserting the data.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What is a major challenge in re-sharding data when a shard becomes too large or too small?

<p>It is difficult and resource-intensive.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What is the purpose of the shard key, and why is it crucial to choose the right one?

<p>The shard key is a specific column or set of columns used to determine the distribution of data across shards, and choosing the right shard key is crucial for balancing the load and avoiding hotspots.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What are the three common strategies for shard mapping, and how do they work?

<p>The three common strategies for shard mapping are hash-based sharding, range-based sharding, and directory-based sharding.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What is the purpose of data distribution strategies in sharding, and how do they ensure load balancing?

<p>Data distribution strategies, such as hash-based sharding and range-based sharding, ensure that data is distributed evenly across shards, preventing any single shard from becoming a bottleneck.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What is the importance of replication in sharding, and how does it enhance fault tolerance?

<p>Replication in sharding enhances fault tolerance by ensuring that each shard can be replicated to multiple nodes, making the system more resilient to failures.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What are the benefits of sharding in terms of performance, scalability, and availability?

<p>Sharding improves performance by distributing the load across multiple servers, allows for horizontal scaling, and enhances availability and fault tolerance by isolating failures to individual shards.</p> Signup and view all the answers

What are the challenges of sharding in terms of complexity, data consistency, and query routing?

<p>Sharding adds complexity to database management, requires sophisticated mechanisms for data consistency, and can be challenging for query routing.</p> Signup and view all the answers

How does sharding address the problem of single point of failure, and what are the implications for system availability?

<p>Sharding isolates failures to individual shards, preventing a single point of failure and enhancing overall system availability.</p> Signup and view all the answers

Flashcards

Sharding

Distributing table rows across multiple databases.

Shard Key

Column(s) used to decide which shard data goes to.

Hash-Based Sharding

Data distribution using a hash function on shard keys.

Range-Based Sharding

Data divided into ranges based on shard keys.

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Directory-Based Sharding

Uses a lookup table to map keys to shards.

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Load Balancing in Sharding

Ensuring each shard has a similar data load.

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Fault Tolerance in Sharding

Replication to multiple nodes enhances reliability.

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Sharding Benefits

Improved performance, scalability, availability, and fault tolerance.

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Sharding Challenges

Increased complexity, data consistency issues, re-sharding difficulties and maintenance.

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Data Consistency (Sharding)

Maintaining data accuracy across all shards.

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Shard Mapping

Process of assigning data to specific shards.

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Re-sharding

Moving data between shards, often to balance load.

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Horizontal Scaling

Adding more shards to increase capacity.

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Query Routing

Directing queries to the correct shard.

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Study Notes

Core Concepts of Sharding

  • Sharding is a form of horizontal partitioning, where rows of a table are distributed across multiple databases.
  • A shard key is a specific column or set of columns used to determine the distribution of data across shards.
  • Shard mapping involves mapping data to specific shards based on the shard key, using strategies such as hash-based, range-based, and directory-based sharding.

Data Distribution Strategies

  • Hash-Based Sharding: uses a hash function on the shard key to distribute data evenly across shards.
  • Range-Based Sharding: divides data into contiguous ranges based on the shard key.
  • Directory-Based Sharding: uses a lookup table to map each shard key to a specific shard.

Load Balancing and Fault Tolerance

  • Load balancing ensures that each shard holds a balanced amount of data to prevent any single shard from becoming a bottleneck.
  • Sharding should be combined with replication to enhance fault tolerance, where each shard can be replicated to multiple nodes to ensure high availability.

Benefits of Sharding

  • Improved Performance: distributes the load across multiple servers, reducing the burden on any single database and improving read and write performance.
  • Scalability: allows the database to handle increased load by adding more shards, thus enabling horizontal scaling.
  • Availability and Fault Tolerance: isolates failures to individual shards, preventing a single point of failure and enhancing overall system availability.

Challenges of Sharding

  • Complexity: adds complexity to database management, requiring sophisticated mechanisms for shard key selection, data distribution, and query routing.
  • Data Consistency: ensuring consistency across shards can be challenging, especially for cross-shard transactions.
  • Re-sharding: re-distributing data when a shard becomes too large or too small can be difficult and resource-intensive.
  • Maintenance: requires ongoing monitoring and maintenance to balance load and ensure optimal performance.

Example of Sharding in Practice

  • Sharding can be used to distribute user data across multiple databases in a social media platform, improving performance and scalability.
  • A step-by-step implementation of sharding involves choosing a shard key, determining the sharding strategy, configuring shards, implementing shard mapping, inserting data, and retrieving data.

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