redpanda-data / redpanda-data/connect

The `fallback` output should stop trying to send messages to unreachable outputs

Open
#1,210 4 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

Nobody has claimed this yet.

enhancement outputs v5
Dominant language
Go
Stars
8.8k
Forks
969
Avg merge
1d 13h
Merged PRs (30d)
64

Description

The following config will keep trying to send messages to the kafka_franz output if it's unavailable, although there's an stdout fallback output configured:

input:
  generate:
    mapping: |
      root.id = count("foo_counter1")
    interval: 0s
    count: 3

pipeline:
  threads: 1
  processors:
    - bloblang: |
        root = match {
          this.id == 1 => {"msg": "foo"}
          this.id == 2 => {"msg": "bar"}
          _ => throw("UNKNOWN ID")
        }

        root.id = this.id

output:
  switch:
    retry_until_success: true
    cases:
      - check: errored()
        output:
          stdout:
            codec: lines
          processors:
            - log:
                message: "errored message: ${! json()}"

      - output:
          fallback:
            - kafka_franz:
                seed_brokers:
                  - localhost:6666
                topic: test
            - stdout:
                codec: lines
          processors:
            - log:
                message: "successful message: ${! json()}"

logger:
  level: DEBUG
  format: json
  add_timestamp: true
  static_fields:
    "@service": benthos

shutdown_timeout: 3s # Default 20s

From the Discord chat, it looks like the solution would be to try and detect connection loss via an enhancement.

LE: Might be nice to also have an exponential_backoff field which tells fallthrough to wait a bit more time before trying again to send a message to an output which is experiencing connectivity issues.

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by reproducing the provided YAML configuration and observing how the fallback output handles an unavailable kafka_franz output. Trace the fallback behavior and connection-loss handling from the relevant output entry points; done means unreachable outputs stop being retried when a fallback is available, with any backoff behavior explicitly defined and tested.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
go, kafka
Domain
stream-processing
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

Get new issues in your inbox

A short digest of beginner-friendly GitHub issues.