BigData / Apache Airflow Interview Questions

What are Hooks in Apache Airflow?

Hooks are interfaces to external platforms and databases. They abstract connection handling, authentication, and API calls so operators and tasks don't need to manage those details directly. Hooks use Connections (stored in the metadata DB) to retrieve credentials.

Example using the S3Hook:

from airflow.providers.amazon.aws.hooks.s3 import S3Hook

hook = S3Hook(aws_conn_id='my_aws')
hook.load_file(filename='/tmp/data.csv', key='uploads/data.csv', bucket_name='my-bucket')

Common built-in hooks include PostgresHook, MySqlHook, HttpHook, S3Hook, BigQueryHook, and many provider-contributed hooks.

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What is the primary purpose of a Hook in Airflow? To schedule DAG runs

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To interface with external systems using stored Connections

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To pass data between tasks

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To store configuration variables

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