Introduction

Apache HBase is a non-relational distributed, scalable key-value data store. It provides random read/write, real-time access to HDFS.

In this chapter, we will configure the various modes of the HBase cluster. In simple terms, it is a Hadoop database based on column families with massive scale. The important thing to note is that having a column family does not make it column oriented or NoSQL. There is a common misconception, where many refer to HBase as a column-oriented database even though it isn't, and secondly, a column-oriented database is not necessarily a NoSQL database.

In this chapter, we will cover the HBase cluster configuration, backup, restore, and upgrade processes.