Specific Kafka Brokers on Specific Kubernetes Nodes

[remotejon]

I have an existing Kafka cluster deployed with 3 brokers (one per node in Kubernetes). They all use Ceph for storage currently. I would like to be able to add a 4th broker to the cluster that will use some raid storage on specific Kubernetes node, so I'd need to specify that this new broker always uses that node. Reading the docs, and testing a few things out, i've not managed to get the affinity part to work. It seems that Strimzi will only allow an all or nothing approach using template.pod.affinity (all brokers would eventually be scheduled to my raid node). I've also found reference to broker level tolerations - but that isn't supported in my version of Strimzi.
We don't really want to lose Strimzi. Is there a way to do this other than what I've described?

Thanks in advance

Kafka Version: 3.5.1
Strimzi Version: 0.39.0

[scholzj]

If you want to use a different configuration for different brokers, you can do it, for example, using multiple different KafkaNodePools: https://strimzi.io/blog/2023/08/14/kafka-node-pools-introduction/. That would allow you to configure different affinities for different pools of brokers. However, keep in mind that Kafka does not have any advanced support for asymmetric configurations of different brokers such as different storage. So be careful whether you really want to have 3 brokers using Ceph and the 4th one using something else. Technically, it is possible. But there will be no intelligent balancing between the brokers out of the box etc.

(Also please keep in mind that you are using pretty old Strimzi version. So check first what it supports and what not ... and make sure to upgrade Strimzi first if needed.)

[remotejon]

Thank you for taking the time to reply - I've read the docs this morning (in your link) and now understand what I need to do now.
J