Cassandra K8s study guide
Cassandra K8s · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
The Cassandra K8s exam validates the practical skills needed to run Apache Cassandra on Kubernetes using an operator-based deployment model. It is aimed at platform engineers, SREs, and database administrators who already understand containers and want to prove they can operate a distributed database safely on a dynamic scheduler. The Cassandra K8s study guide has 10 sections and about 2,650 words.
01Kubernetes fundamentals for stateful workloads
This domain tests how Kubernetes primitives behave when a Pod is not disposable: stable identity, per-Pod storage, ordered rollout, and disruption control. A StatefulSet gives each replica an ordinal name ( cassandra-0 ), stable DNS through a headless Service, and its own PVC from volumeClaimTemplates .
284 words, about 1 min02Cassandra architecture and data modeling review
This domain checks whether you can connect ring mechanics to schema choices: how a partition key maps to tokens and replicas, and how consistency levels change availability. The partition key is hashed to a token; the ring places replicas according to replication factor and strategy.
267 words, about 1 min03Cassandra operator installation and lifecycle management
This domain tests the control loop: installing the operator and CRDs, declaring a CassandraDatacenter , and letting reconciliation own the StatefulSets, Services, and configuration. The cass-operator watches CassandraDatacenter resources and reconciles generated objects toward the declared state.
258 words, about 1 min04Cluster topology, racks, and node configuration
Topology questions test whether replicas land in separate failure domains and whether the Kubernetes scheduler actually honors the rack plan. A Cassandra rack is a failure domain; in Kubernetes it usually maps to a zone or a dedicated node pool.
270 words, about 1 min05Persistent storage, StatefulSets, and volume management
This domain tests whether storage survives Pod churn and whether volumes bind in the same zone as the Pod that needs them. volumeClaimTemplates creates one PVC per StatefulSet ordinal; the PVC outlives the Pod.
271 words, about 1 min06Networking, services, and client connectivity
Clients and peers use different network paths, and the exam tests whether you can expose CQL without breaking internode traffic. A headless Service provides stable per-Pod DNS for peer discovery and StatefulSet identity.
247 words, about 1 min07Security: TLS, authentication, and authorization
This domain tests three separate controls: encrypting traffic, proving identity, and limiting what an authenticated role can do. Internode TLS protects gossip and streaming; client TLS protects CQL and can require client certificates.
259 words, about 1 min08Backup, restore, and disaster recovery
This domain tests whether data can be recovered after node loss, namespace deletion, or a bad upgrade, not merely whether a snapshot command exits zero. A local Cassandra snapshot is not a disaster-recovery backup; it lives on the same volume.
277 words, about 1 min09Monitoring, metrics, and observability
This domain tests whether you can tell a healthy Cassandra node from a healthy Pod and diagnose latency with the right signals. JMX exposes Cassandra metrics; a JMX exporter or agent converts them to Prometheus format.
262 words, about 1 min10Scaling, upgrades, and rolling operations
This domain tests change control: adding or removing nodes and changing versions without dropping below quorum. Scale through the CassandraDatacenter size; the operator adds nodes and bootstraps them.
255 words, about 1 min