Hortonworks Hadoop distribution

Hortonworks, although late in the game (founded in 2011), has quickly emerged as a leading vendor in the big data market. Hortonworks was started by Yahoo engineers. The biggest differentiator between Hortonworks and other Hadoop distributions is that Hortonworks is the only commercial vendor to offer its enterprise Hadoop distribution completely free and 100% open source. Unlike Cloudera, Hortonworks focuses on embedding Hadoop in existing data platforms. Hortonworks has two major product releases. Hortonworks Data Platform (HDP) provides an enterprise-grade open source Apache Hadoop distribution, while Hortonworks Data Flow (HDF) provides the only end-to-end platform that collects, curates, analyzes, and acts on data in real time and on-premises or in the cloud, with a drag-and-drop visual interface. In addition to products, Hortonworks also provides services such as training, consultancy, and support through its partner network. Now, let's look at its pros and cons.

Pros of the Hortonworks Hadoop distribution include the following:

• 100% open source-based enterprise Hadoop implementation with commercial license need
• Hortonworks provides additional open source-based tools to monitor and administer clusters

Cons of the Hortonworks Hadoop distribution include the following:

• As a business strategy, Hortonworks has focused on developing the platform layer so, for customers planning to utilize Hortonworks clusters, the cost to build capabilities is higher