1. What is Data Engineering, and how is it different from Data Science?

Answer:
Data Engineering focuses on designing, developing, and managing infrastructure and tools for collecting, storing,
processing, and analyzing large volumes of data. It ensures data is clean, reliable, and ready for analysis or
machine learning tasks. Data Engineers build pipelines and data architectures that Data Scientists and analysts use.

In contrast, Data Science focuses on extracting insights from data using statistical analysis, machine learning, and
data visualization techniques. While Data Engineers build the platforms, Data Scientists focus on modeling and
inference. Without the foundational work of Data Engineers, Data Scientists would struggle to access and work
with high-quality data.

2. What is a Data Pipeline? Explain its components.

Answer:
A data pipeline is a series of processes and tools that automate the movement and transformation of data from
source systems to target storage (like a data lake or data warehouse).

Main Components:

 Ingestion Layer: Captures data from various sources (databases, APIs, IoT devices, logs).
 Processing Layer: Applies transformations, filters, aggregations (ETL/ELT logic).
 Storage Layer: Stores the processed data (data lakes, warehouses).
 Orchestration Layer: Manages the scheduling and dependency of pipeline tasks (e.g., Apache Airflow).
 Monitoring Layer: Tracks pipeline health and handles failures (e.g., logging, alerts).

Effective pipelines are scalable, fault-tolerant, and optimized for performance.

3. What are the differences between ETL and ELT?

Answer:
ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) and ELT (Extract, Load, Transform) are two paradigms for preparing and
moving data from source systems to a destination (e.g., data warehouse).

 ETL:
o Data is first extracted, transformed outside the destination, then loaded.
o Transformation occurs before loading.
o Suited for traditional on-premise systems with limited compute in the target.
 ELT:
o Data is extracted and immediately loaded into the target system.
o Transformation is done inside the data warehouse using its compute power.
o Popular with cloud-native platforms like Snowflake or BigQuery.

ELT enables scalability and better performance in modern, cloud-based systems.

4. Describe the architecture of a modern Data Lake.

Answer:
A modern Data Lake is a centralized repository designed to store raw data in its native format. It supports both
structured and unstructured data.

Key layers:

 Ingestion Layer: Ingests data from various sources in real-time (Kafka, Flume) or batch (Sqoop,
Dataflow).
 Storage Layer: Usually cloud-based object storage (AWS S3, Azure Blob Storage, GCP GCS).
 Cataloging Layer: Metadata management using Glue, Hive Metastore, or Apache Atlas.
 Processing Layer: Includes batch (Apache Spark, Hadoop) or streaming (Apache Flink, Kafka Streams).
 Security & Governance Layer: Access controls, data lineage, GDPR/CCPA compliance.

Data Lakes support scalability, flexibility, and analytics at scale, enabling advanced machine learning and big data
workloads.

5. What is Data Partitioning and Why is it Important?

Answer:
Data Partitioning is the technique of dividing a large dataset into smaller, manageable chunks, called partitions,
based on specific columns (e.g., date, region).

Benefits:

 Performance: Queries run faster by scanning only relevant partitions.

 Parallelism: Enables parallel processing across nodes in a distributed system.
 Manageability: Easier data retention and deletion policies per partition.

Partitioning is a key optimization in big data systems like Hive, Spark, and BigQuery.

6. What are some challenges in designing a scalable Data Pipeline?

Answer:
Designing scalable data pipelines involves numerous technical challenges:

 Data Volume: Handling terabytes/petabytes of data daily.

 Latency: Managing low-latency for near real-time processing.
 Data Quality: Ensuring clean, consistent, and deduplicated data.
 Schema Evolution: Adapting to changes in data structure.
 Fault Tolerance: Recovery from system failures or data corruption.
 Monitoring: Observability into performance and errors.
 Orchestration: Managing dependencies and retries in multi-step pipelines.

A scalable pipeline is modular, testable, fault-tolerant, and automates error handling.

7. What is Apache Airflow, and how does it help in Data Engineering?

Answer:
Apache Airflow is an open-source workflow orchestration tool used to author, schedule, and monitor data
pipelines. Pipelines are defined as DAGs (Directed Acyclic Graphs) in Python code.

Features:

 Declarative pipeline structure.

 Task dependencies and retries.
 Built-in logging and monitoring.
 Integration with cloud services and databases.

Airflow ensures the automation, repeatability, and monitoring of complex data workflows, making it a central tool
in modern data engineering stacks.

8. Explain Data Warehousing and its role in analytics.

Answer:
A Data Warehouse is a centralized repository optimized for storing and querying large volumes of structured data
for business intelligence and analytics.

Characteristics:

 Optimized for read-heavy operations.

 Supports OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) queries.
 Data is modeled in star or snowflake schemas.
 Uses columnar storage for performance (e.g., Redshift, Snowflake).

Data Warehouses provide a single source of truth, enabling dashboards, KPI tracking, and business reporting.

9. What is the Lambda Architecture in Data Engineering?

Answer:
Lambda Architecture is a data processing design pattern for handling large-scale data systems with both batch
and real-time processing.

Three Layers:

 Batch Layer: Stores immutable, raw data and performs batch processing for accuracy.
 Speed Layer: Processes real-time data for low-latency insights.
 Serving Layer: Merges batch and real-time views for consumption.

Though powerful, it adds complexity. Newer alternatives like Kappa Architecture simplify this by focusing on
stream-only processing.

10. What is a Slowly Changing Dimension (SCD)? Describe its types.

Answer:
Slowly Changing Dimensions (SCDs) refer to how historical data changes are tracked in dimensional data
models.

Types:

 Type 1: Overwrites old data (no history).

 Type 2: Keeps history by adding new records with versioning.
 Type 3: Tracks limited history in the same row using additional columns.

SCD handling is crucial in data warehousing to ensure accurate historical reporting.

11. How do you ensure Data Quality in pipelines?

Answer:
Ensuring Data Quality involves validating, cleaning, and monitoring data throughout the pipeline.

Strategies:

 Validation Rules: Null checks, range checks, type checks.

 Deduplication: Identify and remove duplicates.
 Standardization: Normalize values (e.g., date formats).
 Auditing: Track data lineage and transformations.
 Automated Tests: Unit and integration tests for data logic.
 Monitoring: Use tools like Great Expectations, Monte Carlo for anomaly detection.

Data quality ensures accurate analytics and downstream trust in data.

12. What is the role of a Message Broker in Data Engineering?

Answer:
A Message Broker (e.g., Apache Kafka, RabbitMQ) is used to decouple producers and consumers in data systems,
enabling scalable, real-time data flows.

Benefits:

 Buffering: Handles bursts in data ingestion.

 Decoupling: Systems communicate asynchronously.
 Scalability: Handles millions of events per second.
 Reliability: Persistent message storage and replay.

Message brokers are core components in event-driven and streaming architectures.

13. What is Data Lineage and why is it important?

Answer:
Data Lineage traces the lifecycle of data—its origin, transformations, and destination.

Importance:

 Transparency: Understand where data came from and how it changed.

 Debugging: Trace errors to the source.
 Compliance: Audit trails for GDPR, HIPAA.
 Impact Analysis: Assess downstream impact of schema changes.

Tools like Apache Atlas, Amundsen, and OpenLineage help visualize and track lineage.

14. Explain the CAP Theorem and its relevance in distributed data systems.

Answer:
The CAP Theorem states that in a distributed data system, it is impossible to simultaneously guarantee all three:

 Consistency: All nodes see the same data at the same time.
 Availability: System remains responsive.
 Partition Tolerance: System continues working during network failures.

Systems must make trade-offs:

 CP: HBase, MongoDB (focus on consistency).

 AP: CouchDB, Cassandra (focus on availability).

Understanding CAP helps design systems based on specific data needs.

15. What is Schema Evolution and how is it handled?

Answer:
Schema Evolution refers to the ability to modify a data schema over time without breaking existing pipelines or
systems.

Common changes:

 Adding columns (non-breaking).

 Removing or renaming fields (breaking).
 Changing data types (may or may not break).

Handling Tools:

 Avro/Parquet (support schema evolution with metadata).

 Apache Hive with external tables.
 Lakehouse platforms (e.g., Delta Lake) provide versioning and schema enforcement.

It ensures flexibility in dynamic environments where source data changes often.

16. What is the difference between Row-Based and Columnar Storage?

Answer:

 Row-Based Storage (e.g., MySQL, PostgreSQL): Stores records row-wise; efficient for transactional
queries (OLTP).
 Columnar Storage (e.g., Parquet, ORC, Redshift): Stores data by columns; efficient for analytical queries
(OLAP).

Benefits of Columnar:

 Faster aggregations and scans on selected columns.

 Better compression ratios.
 Reduced I/O for analytics.

Columnar storage is standard in modern data warehouses and big data platforms.

17. How do you design a fault-tolerant Data Pipeline?

Answer:
A fault-tolerant pipeline must gracefully handle and recover from errors.

Key Techniques:

 Retry Mechanisms: Re-attempt failed operations.

 Checkpointing: Save intermediate states (especially in streaming).
 Dead-letter Queues: Handle unprocessable messages separately.
 Idempotent Operations: Ensure reprocessing doesn’t duplicate data.
 Monitoring & Alerts: Detect failures quickly.

Tools like Kafka (with offsets), Spark Structured Streaming (checkpointing), and Airflow (task retries) support
fault-tolerance.

18. What are Data Mesh and its advantages over traditional architectures?

Answer:
Data Mesh is a modern approach to data architecture that decentralizes data ownership and treats data as a
product.

Principles:

 Domain-Oriented Ownership: Each team manages its own data.

 Data as a Product: High-quality, discoverable, trustworthy data.
 Self-Service Infrastructure: Empower teams with tools to publish/share data.
 Federated Governance: Balance autonomy and compliance.
Compared to centralized data lakes/warehouses, Data Mesh scales better in large organizations by aligning data
ownership with domain expertise.