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Database / RocksDB Basics Interview Questions

What is Merge in RocksDB?

Merge is a special write operation that lets an application apply an incremental update to a key's value without first reading its current value.

  • Common example: incrementing a counter, where you want to add a value rather than overwrite the whole thing
  • Requires the application to supply a Merge Operator, custom logic defining how multiple pending merge operations should eventually be combined into a single value
  • RocksDB defers actually applying the merge logic until a read happens or compaction processes the relevant data, rather than computing it immediately on every write

This operation avoids the classic read-modify-write pattern's overhead and potential race conditions, letting an application record "add 1" as its own lightweight write instead.

What does Merge let an application avoid?
What must an application supply to use Merge?

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What is RocksDB? Who developed RocksDB? What is RocksDB based on? What is a Key-Value Store? Define the LSM-Tree (Log-Structured Merge-Tree)? What is a MemTable in RocksDB? What data structure implements RocksDB's default MemTable? What is a Write-Ahead Log (WAL) in RocksDB? What is an SSTable in RocksDB? What is Flushing in RocksDB? What is Compaction in RocksDB? What are the Compaction Styles supported by RocksDB? Define Leveled Compaction? Define Universal Compaction? What is a Bloom Filter in RocksDB? What is an Index Block in an SSTable? What is a Block Cache in RocksDB? What is the Manifest file in RocksDB? What are Column Families in RocksDB? What is a Comparator in RocksDB? What is a Snapshot in RocksDB? What is an Iterator in RocksDB? What is the purpose of the Put operation in RocksDB? What is the purpose of the Get operation in RocksDB? What is the purpose of the Delete operation in RocksDB? What is a Tombstone in RocksDB? What is Merge in RocksDB? What is Write Amplification? What is Read Amplification? What is Space Amplification? What is the purpose of Levels (L0 to Ln) in RocksDB's storage hierarchy? Describe the Write Path in RocksDB? Describe the Read Path in RocksDB? What is an Immutable MemTable? What is a Skip List? What programming language is RocksDB written in? What types of systems use RocksDB internally? What is a Transaction in RocksDB? What is Backup and Restore in RocksDB? What is a Checkpoint in RocksDB? Describe how Compression is used in RocksDB? What is the purpose of a Data Block within an SSTable? What is Prefix Seek in RocksDB? What is a Merge Operator in RocksDB? List common configuration options that affect RocksDB performance? What is a Sync Write versus an Async Write in RocksDB? What is the purpose of the Options object in RocksDB's API?
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