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  5. Apache Beam vs Google Cloud Dataflow

Apache Beam vs Google Cloud Dataflow

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Google Cloud Dataflow
Google Cloud Dataflow
Stacks219
Followers497
Votes19
Apache Beam
Apache Beam
Stacks183
Followers361
Votes14

Apache Beam vs Google Cloud Dataflow: What are the differences?

<Apache Beam vs Google Cloud Dataflow>

1. **Integration with Multiple Processing Engines**: Apache Beam is a unified model that allows you to run your data processing pipelines on different processing engines such as Apache Flink, Apache Spark, and Google Cloud Dataflow. On the other hand, Google Cloud Dataflow is a fully managed service provided by Google Cloud Platform that specifically runs Apache Beam pipelines on its infrastructure, offering scalability, monitoring, and easy integration with other GCP services.
   
2. **Pricing Model**: Apache Beam is an open-source project and can be run on any cloud provider or on-premises without any additional cost. In contrast, Google Cloud Dataflow has a pay-as-you-go pricing model where you are charged based on the resources used and the processing power required for your pipelines, making it a more cost-effective solution for large-scale data processing projects.

3. **Managed Service Benefits**: While both Apache Beam and Google Cloud Dataflow support parallel processing, fault tolerance, and event-time processing, Google Cloud Dataflow provides additional benefits as a fully managed service such as automatic scaling, integration with other GCP services like BigQuery and Pub/Sub, and built-in monitoring and logging capabilities, reducing the operational overhead for managing the infrastructure. Apache Beam, on the other hand, requires more manual configuration and management of the underlying infrastructure.

4. **Data Source Connectivity**: Google Cloud Dataflow offers seamless integration with Google Cloud Storage, Bigtable, Datastore, and other GCP services, making it easier to ingest and process data from these sources. Apache Beam, being an open-source project, provides connectors to a wide range of data sources and sinks, including various file formats, databases, and messaging systems, making it more flexible in terms of data source connectivity.

5. **Community Support and Development**: Apache Beam has a strong community of contributors and users who actively provide support, contribute to the development of new features, and share best practices for building efficient data pipelines. Google Cloud Dataflow, while benefiting from the Apache Beam community, has dedicated support from Google Cloud Platform engineers for managing and optimizing data processing pipelines on the GCP infrastructure, ensuring timely updates and enhancements.

6. **Deployment Flexibility**: Apache Beam allows you to deploy your pipelines on different environments such as on-premises, cloud, or hybrid setups, giving you more flexibility in choosing where to run your data processing workloads. Google Cloud Dataflow, on the other hand, is specifically designed to run on the Google Cloud Platform, limiting the deployment options to GCP infrastructure but providing seamless integration with other GCP services for a more streamlined workflow.

In Summary, Apache Beam and Google Cloud Dataflow offer different advantages in terms of integration, pricing, managed services, data source connectivity, community support, and deployment flexibility for building and running data processing pipelines.

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Advice on Google Cloud Dataflow, Apache Beam

Sergey
Sergey

May 26, 2020

Needs advice

I need to design a pipeline for ingesting streaming data (video, audio, and telemetry) from remote video cameras to Cloud AI/ML services. Cameras can be wired or wireless. So connection can be unstable. The video should be processed separately from each camera. Telemetry and audio can be added in the future, for now, it's only video stream. Looking for a solution for GCP. Thanks!

7.29k views7.29k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Google Cloud Dataflow
Google Cloud Dataflow
Apache Beam
Apache Beam

Google Cloud Dataflow is a unified programming model and a managed service for developing and executing a wide range of data processing patterns including ETL, batch computation, and continuous computation. Cloud Dataflow frees you from operational tasks like resource management and performance optimization.

It implements batch and streaming data processing jobs that run on any execution engine. It executes pipelines on multiple execution environments.

Fully managed; Combines batch and streaming with a single API; High performance with automatic workload rebalancing Open source SDK;
-
Statistics
Stacks
219
Stacks
183
Followers
497
Followers
361
Votes
19
Votes
14
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 7
    Unified batch and stream processing
  • 5
    Autoscaling
  • 4
    Fully managed
  • 3
    Throughput Transparency
Pros
  • 5
    Cross-platform
  • 5
    Open-source
  • 2
    Unified batch and stream processing
  • 2
    Portable

What are some alternatives to Google Cloud Dataflow, Apache Beam?

Airflow

Airflow

Use Airflow to author workflows as directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) of tasks. The Airflow scheduler executes your tasks on an array of workers while following the specified dependencies. Rich command lines utilities makes performing complex surgeries on DAGs a snap. The rich user interface makes it easy to visualize pipelines running in production, monitor progress and troubleshoot issues when needed.

GitHub Actions

GitHub Actions

It makes it easy to automate all your software workflows, now with world-class CI/CD. Build, test, and deploy your code right from GitHub. Make code reviews, branch management, and issue triaging work the way you want.

Zenaton

Zenaton

Developer framework to orchestrate multiple services and APIs into your software application using logic triggered by events and time. Build ETL processes, A/B testing, real-time alerts and personalized user experiences with custom logic.

Amazon Kinesis

Amazon Kinesis

Amazon Kinesis can collect and process hundreds of gigabytes of data per second from hundreds of thousands of sources, allowing you to easily write applications that process information in real-time, from sources such as web site click-streams, marketing and financial information, manufacturing instrumentation and social media, and operational logs and metering data.

Luigi

Luigi

It is a Python module that helps you build complex pipelines of batch jobs. It handles dependency resolution, workflow management, visualization etc. It also comes with Hadoop support built in.

Unito

Unito

Build and map powerful workflows across tools to save your team time. No coding required. Create rules to define what information flows between each of your tools, in minutes.

Shipyard

Shipyard

na

iLeap

iLeap

ILeap is a low-code app development platform to build custom apps and automate workflows visually, helping you speed up digital transformation.

PromptX

PromptX

PromptX is an AI-powered enterprise knowledge and workflow platform that helps organizations search, discover and act on information with speed and accuracy. It unifies data from SharePoint, Google Drive, email, cloud systems and legacy databases into one secure Enterprise Knowledge System. Using generative and agentic AI, users can ask natural language questions and receive context-rich, verifiable answers in seconds. PromptX ingests and enriches content with semantic tagging, entity recognition and knowledge cards, turning unstructured data into actionable insights. With adaptive prompts, collaborative workspaces and AI-driven workflows, teams make faster, data-backed decisions. The platform includes RBAC, SSO, audit trails and compliance-ready AI governance, and integrates with any LLM or external search engine. It supports cloud, hybrid and on-premise deployments for healthcare, public sector, finance and enterprise service providers. PromptX converts disconnected data into trusted and actionable intelligence, bringing search, collaboration and automation into a single unified experience.

AI Autopilot

AI Autopilot

Agentic AI Platform for Intelligent IT Automation built by MSPs for MSPs. Revolutionize your operations with advanced AI agents.

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