This leads us to the next challenge in replicating the data warehouse experience on the data lakehouse: cataloging tables so they are governable and discoverable across different tools. This is where a new race establishes the open standard at the catalog level in Apache Iceberg.
Apache Iceberg catalogs differ from enterprise uae whatsapp number data catalogs like Collibra. The former enables tools to discover tables for table portability, while the latter allows individuals to discover datasets, find context, and request access. If using Apache Spark or Upsolver for ingestion and then using another platform to run analytics on those Iceberg tables, the Iceberg catalog ensures all these tools can work consistently with the tables.
In the past, these catalogs required support to be developed for each catalog in every language that supports Iceberg (Java, Python, Rust, Go), resulting in inconsistent catalog support and posing a barrier to the “use the tools you want” paradigm of the data lakehouse. To address this, the Apache Iceberg project developed the “REST Catalog specification.” This openAPI specification establishes a standard for service catalogs by outlining the necessary server endpoints. It allows catalog services to be written in any language and used by clients in any language, ensuring that any tool supporting the specification can work with all catalogs implementing it, thereby significantly reducing catalog interoperability concerns.