IN-PERSON: Apache Kafka® Meetup - July 2026

Join us for an Apache Kafka® meetup on July 9th from 6:00pm hosted by Salesforce!

PLEASE bring your PHOTO ID and REGISTER with your First and Last Name. For security purpose

📍 Venue:
Salesforce
333 Seymour St #700, Vancouver, BC V6B 5A7
Social Lounge

IMPORTANT: Please arrive on time so that we can check you in, many thanks!

🗓 Agenda:

• 6:00pm - 6:30pm: Doors Open, Networking, Pizza and Drinks
• 6:30pm - 7:00pm: Xiao Meng, Software Engineer, Goldsky
• 7:00pm - 7:30pm: Parul Lakhotia, Senior software engineer, Salesforce
• 7:30pm - 8:30pm: More networking, Q&A

💡Speaker One: Xiao Meng, Software Engineer, Goldsky

Title of Talk: CDC + Kafka: Turning Databases into Event Streams

Abstract:
Transactional databases are often the source of truth for operational

data, but modern systems need that data in many places: analytics,
search, APIs, and real-time products. Change Data Capture (CDC) with
Kafka turns database inserts, updates, and deletes into event streams,
where each table can become a durable, replayable topic.

This talk introduces Postgres CDC from first principles: how database
changes are captured, how they map to Kafka records and topics, and
what design choices matter for ordering, deletes, schema changes,
snapshots, and replay. I’ll also give a quick overview of the tools
that make CDC practical in production.

Finally, I’ll share a Goldsky case study on using WarpStream, a
diskless Kafka-compatible system, as a real-time data lake with
infinite retention for CDC data. We use this architecture to stream
thousands of tables into Kafka topics and power a service that mirrors
indexed blockchain application data into real-time data products.

Bio:
Xiao Meng is a software engineer specializing in data infrastructure,
stream processing, and SRE. He is the Streaming Team Lead at Goldsky,
where he leads development of a declarative, serverless real-time data
platform for blockchain data. Previously, he was an Expert Data
Engineer at Activision/Demonware, building a real-time game telemetry
platform for titles including Call of Duty.

💡Speaker Two: Parul Lakhotia, Senior software engineer, Salesforce

Title of Talk: Dynamic Kafka Scaling in Kubernetes

Abstract:
Kafka's stateful architecture and rebalancing requirements make it inherently challenging to autoscale. While Kubernetes HPA excels at scaling stateless applications based on resource metrics, Kafka clusters require careful broker lifecycle management, partition redistribution, and persistent volume handling—operations that extend beyond HPA's native capabilities.

This presentation describes a production-ready autoscaler that extends Kubernetes HPA to manage Kafka broker scaling through Cruise Control integration. The system implements a metric-agnostic evaluation engine that processes resource metrics (per-AZ broker capacity) to determine optimal replica counts. Scaling decisions execute through Cruise Control's broker management APIs, ensuring partitions are properly rebalanced and data remains available throughout scale operations.

Bio:
Senior software engineer on the Salesforce Kafka team

***** If you are interested in hosting/speaking at a meetup, please email community@confluent.io**