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flink
Process real-time data streams with Apache Flink. Use when a user asks to build real-time analytics, process event streams with low latency, implement complex event processing, or run stateful stream processing at scale.
#flink#streaming#real-time#analytics#events
terminal-skillsv1.0.0
Works with:claude-codeopenai-codexgemini-clicursor
Usage
$
✓ Installed flink v1.0.0
Getting Started
- Install the skill using the command above
- Open your AI coding agent (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, or Cursor)
- Reference the skill in your prompt
- The AI will use the skill's capabilities automatically
Example Prompts
- "Analyze the sales data in revenue.csv and identify trends"
- "Create a visualization comparing Q1 vs Q2 performance metrics"
Documentation
Overview
Flink is a distributed stream processing engine for real-time analytics. Unlike batch-first systems (Spark), Flink is stream-first — it processes events as they arrive with millisecond latency. Supports exactly-once semantics, stateful processing, and event time windowing.
Instructions
Step 1: PyFlink Setup
bash
pip install apache-flink
Step 2: Stream Processing
python
# stream_job.py — Real-time event processing with PyFlink
from pyflink.datastream import StreamExecutionEnvironment
from pyflink.datastream.connectors.kafka import FlinkKafkaConsumer, FlinkKafkaProducer
from pyflink.common.serialization import SimpleStringSchema
from pyflink.datastream.window import TumblingEventTimeWindows
from pyflink.common.time import Time
import json
env = StreamExecutionEnvironment.get_execution_environment()
env.set_parallelism(4)
# Read from Kafka
consumer = FlinkKafkaConsumer(
topics='clickstream',
deserialization_schema=SimpleStringSchema(),
properties={
'bootstrap.servers': 'kafka:9092',
'group.id': 'flink-analytics',
}
)
stream = env.add_source(consumer)
# Parse, filter, and aggregate
(stream
.map(lambda x: json.loads(x))
.filter(lambda e: e['event_type'] == 'page_view')
.key_by(lambda e: e['page_url'])
.window(TumblingEventTimeWindows.of(Time.minutes(5)))
.reduce(lambda a, b: {
'page_url': a['page_url'],
'view_count': a.get('view_count', 1) + 1,
'unique_users': list(set(a.get('unique_users', [a['user_id']]) + [b['user_id']])),
})
.map(lambda x: json.dumps(x))
.add_sink(FlinkKafkaProducer(
topic='page-analytics',
serialization_schema=SimpleStringSchema(),
producer_config={'bootstrap.servers': 'kafka:9092'},
))
)
env.execute('Clickstream Analytics')
Step 3: Flink SQL
python
# sql_job.py — Real-time analytics with Flink SQL
from pyflink.table import EnvironmentSettings, TableEnvironment
t_env = TableEnvironment.create(EnvironmentSettings.in_streaming_mode())
# Define Kafka source table
t_env.execute_sql("""
CREATE TABLE orders (
order_id STRING,
user_id STRING,
amount DECIMAL(10, 2),
event_time TIMESTAMP(3),
WATERMARK FOR event_time AS event_time - INTERVAL '5' SECOND
) WITH (
'connector' = 'kafka',
'topic' = 'orders',
'properties.bootstrap.servers' = 'kafka:9092',
'format' = 'json'
)
""")
# Real-time aggregation with tumbling windows
t_env.execute_sql("""
SELECT
TUMBLE_START(event_time, INTERVAL '1' MINUTE) as window_start,
COUNT(*) as order_count,
SUM(amount) as total_revenue,
COUNT(DISTINCT user_id) as unique_buyers
FROM orders
GROUP BY TUMBLE(event_time, INTERVAL '1' MINUTE)
""").print()
Guidelines
- Flink is stream-first; Spark is batch-first with streaming added. Choose Flink for sub-second latency.
- Use event time (not processing time) for accurate windowed aggregations.
- Watermarks handle late-arriving events — configure based on your latency tolerance.
- Managed Flink: AWS Kinesis Data Analytics, Confluent Cloud, or Ververica Platform.
Information
- Version
- 1.0.0
- Author
- terminal-skills
- Category
- Data & AI
- License
- Apache-2.0