Realtime Compute for Apache Flink:Activate Realtime Compute for Apache Flink

Precautions

• The creation of a Flink workspace involves other cloud resources, such as Virtual Private Network (VPC), Object Storage Service (OSS), and cloud monitoring services. For information about their pricing, see Billable items.

• Realtime Compute for Apache Flink adopts a compute-storage separation architecture. When you associate an OSS bucket with your workspace, take note of the following items:

  • You have activated OSS and created a bucket in the same region as your Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace. The storage class of the OSS bucket must be Standard. For more information, see Activate OSS.

  • Do not configure any policies for the associated OSS bucket, such as versioning and retention policies.

    If the versioning feature is enabled for your OSS bucket, an excessive number of delete markers will cause issues such as slow list processing. In this circumstance, you must configure lifecycle rules to periodically remove delete markers and historical versions that you no longer use, so as to reduce storage costs and improve OSS performance. For more information about how to remove delete markers, see Configure lifecycle rules based on the last modified time for versioning-enabled buckets to reduce storage costs.

    Warning

    If you do not enable the versioning feature but want to configure lifecycle rules, DO NOT configure a deletion policy for the directories of Realtime Compute for Apache Flink, including artifacts, flink-jobs, flink-savepoints, sql-artifacts, plan, and flink-sessionclusters. If you configure a deletion policy for one of the preceding directories, Flink-related files may be deleted, leading to runtime exceptions.

  • To implement cross-zone high availability for a Flink workspace whose data is stored in an OSS bucket, make sure that the associated bucket is of the ZRS redundancy type (See Change the storage redundancy type of a bucket). Otherwise, the state data cannot be accessed when the primary zone fails, preventing stateful job startup.

    Note

    A workspace can contain a single-zone namespace and a cross-zone namespace at the same time. We recommend that you associate an OSS bucket of the ZRS redundancy type to a workspace that contains only the cross-zone namespace. This helps achieve high availability at lower storage costs. For more information about OSS storage fees, see Storage fees.

Create a subscription workspace

1. Log on to the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink management console.

2. In the Fully Managed Flink section, click Purchase.

3. (Optional) If you are creating your first Flink workspace, grant the required permissions to access necessary cloud services:

   1. On the Authorization Request page, click Authorize in RAM.

   2. On the RAM Quick Authorization page, click Authorize.

      After automated authorization is complete, your Alibaba Cloud account is granted the necessary permissions to access services required by Realtime Compute for Apache Flink.

4. Configure your workspace, as shown in the table below.

   

   Category	Parameter	Description	Example
   Basic settings	Billing Method	Select Subscription. For details about this billing method, see Subscription.	Subscription
   	Duration	Select a subscription duration as needed.	1 Month
   	Auto-renewal	Specifies whether to enable auto renewal. You can modify the renewal policy after the workspace is created. Follow this process: Log on to the Alibaba Cloud Management Console. In the top navigation bar, choose Expenses. In the left-side navigation pane of the Expense and Cost center, choose Renewal.	N/A
   	CPU architecture	Choose the Intel X86 architecture or YITIAN ARM architecture as needed. Note YITIAN ARM architecture is supported only for a subscription workspace that resides in the China (Beijing), China (Ulanqab), and China (Hangzhou) region. The information on the buy page of Realtime Compute for Apache Flink prevails.	Intel X86 architecture
   	Region	Launch your Flink workspace in the same region as the upstream and downstream services.	China (Beijing)
   Network settings	Deployment model	Only subscription workspaces that use the Intel X86 architecture and reside in specific regions support this configuration. Valid values: Single zone: Realtime Compute for Apache Flink automatically selects the optimal zone in the selected region. Resources are shared within the region to enable transparent scheduling, which enhances resource elasticity. This deployment model is more cost-effective. Cross zone: Enables the cross-zone high availability feature for the workspace. If the primary zone in which a cross-zone namespace resides fails, jobs in the namespace will automatically fail over to the secondary zone. This helps prevent service disruptions caused by faults in a single zone, ensuring service continuity and high availability. Important To implement end-to-end high availability, you must ensure that your upstream and downstream systems are also highly available. If you do not set Deployment model to Cross zone when you activate Realtime Compute for Apache Flink, you can enable the cross-zone high availability feature by using other methods. In this case, ensure that the workspace has sufficient cross-zone Compute Units (CUs). For more information, see Method 2 and Method 3 in Cross-zone high availability.	N/A
   	CU Info	If you set the deployment model to Single zone, you need to configure only the resource quota for CUs of the Single zone type. If you set the deployment model to Cross zone, select the Whether or not to enable mixed purchasing for single-availability zones checkbox as needed. If you do not select this checkbox, configure only the resource quota for CUs of the Cross zone type. If you select this checkbox, configure the resource quotas for CUs of the Single zone and Cross zone types. Note Each workspace requires two additional CUs as management resources for its development console and other necessary components. These management resources are automatically provisioned, eliminating the need for manual configuration. For more information, see Billable items.	-
   	VPC	The VPC in which the Flink workspace resides. After you create the workspace, the VPC that you specified cannot be changed. For more information, see Create a VPC and a vSwitch. If the upstream and downstream services reside in a VPC, the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace must be in the same VPC. Only the following CIDR blocks or their subsets are supported: 192.168.0.0/16, 172.16.0.0/12, and 10.0.0.0/8. The CIDR blocks are standard private CIDR blocks as defined by Request for Comments (RFC) documents.	flink-test-vpc
   	vSwitch	If you set Deployment model to Cross zone, you must select two vSwitches in different zones. Each workspace requires two or three IP addresses. You must specify at least one vSwitch for each zone and plan CIDR blocks based on the scale of your workloads. Note Only vSwitches created in the selected VPC and supported zones are displayed in the drop-down list. After you purchase a workspace, you can modify the vSwitch. The zone in which the selected vSwitch resides is independent of the zone in which the Flink job runs. The vSwitch is used only to ensure network connectivity. Do not modify or delete the configurations of the vSwitch. Any changes to the configurations may adversely affect the network connectivity and proper running of the jobs.	flinktest
   Workspace settings	Workspace Name	The workspace name. The name must be 1 to 60 characters in length and can contain only lowercase letters, digits, and hyphens (-). The name must start with a lowercase letter and cannot end with a hyphen (-). Important The workspace name must be unique across all Alibaba Cloud accounts and in all regions. If the name is already in use, an alert will appear below the field to advise you to choose a different name. Once a workspace is created, the workspace name cannot be changed.	flinktestnamespace
   Storage settings	OSS Bucket	The OSS bucket associated with the workspace. It is used to store data, such as checkpoints, savepoints, logs, and JAR packages. For the content of each directory in an OSS bucket, see Manage artifacts. Important Before associating an OSS bucket with your Flink workspace, read the Precautions section of this topic carefully. When Deployment model is set to Cross zone, OSS configurations will be verified to display only buckets of the ZRS redundancy type in the drop-down list. After the Flink workspace is created, you cannot change the OSS bucket.	flink-test-oss
   Tags and tag values		A tag consists of a tag key and a tag value. Tags are used to identify cloud resources. Tags allow you to categorize, search for, and aggregate cloud resources that have the same characteristics from different dimensions. This helps you manage cloud resources in an efficient manner. You can manage tags on the Tag page of the Resource Management console.	N/A
   Monitoring service	Monitoring service	You can select Free monitoring service or Pay-as-you-go Prometheus monitoring service. For information about their differences, see Feature comparison between CloudMonitor and ARMS. Free monitoring service: After the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace is created, CloudMonitor provides basic monitoring and alerting service. For more information, see Free quotas. Pay-as-you-go Prometheus monitoring service: After the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace is created, ARMS is automatically activated to provide the commercial edition of Managed Service for Prometheus. For more information about the billing of the Prometheus service, see Billing.	Free monitoring service

5. Select the Service Agreement, click Confirm Order, and complete the payment.

   After you complete the payment, click Console. On the page that appears, you can view the workspace that is being created. In general, the creation takes 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

Create a pay-as-you-go workspace

1. Log on to the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink management console.

2. In the Fully Managed Flink section, click Purchase.

3. (Optional) If you are creating your first Flink workspace, grant the required permissions to access necessary cloud services:

   1. On the Authorization Request page, click Authorize in RAM.

   2. On the RAM Quick Authorization page, click Authorize.

      After automated authorization is complete, your Alibaba Cloud account is granted the necessary permissions to access services required by Realtime Compute for Apache Flink.

4. Configure your workspace, as shown in the table below.

   

   Category	Parameter	Description	Example
   Basic settings	Billing Method	Select Pay-as-you-go. For information about this billing method, see Pay-as-you-go.	Pay-as-you-go
   	Region	Launch your Flink workspace in the same region as the upstream and downstream services.	China (Beijing)
   Network settings	VPC	The VPC in which the Flink workspace resides. After you create the workspace, the VPC that you specified cannot be changed. For more information, see Create a VPC and a vSwitch. If the upstream and downstream services reside in a VPC, the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace must be in the same VPC. Only the following CIDR blocks or their subsets are supported: 192.168.0.0/16, 172.16.0.0/12, and 10.0.0.0/8. The CIDR blocks are standard private CIDR blocks as defined by Request for Comments (RFC) documents.	flink-test-vpc
   	vSwitch	If you set Deployment model to Cross zone, you must select two vSwitches in different zones. Each workspace requires two or three IP addresses. You must specify at least one vSwitch for each zone and plan CIDR blocks based on the scale of your workloads. Note Only vSwitches created in the selected VPC and supported zones are displayed in the drop-down list. After you purchase a workspace, you can modify the vSwitch. The zone in which the selected vSwitch resides is independent of the zone in which the Flink job runs. The vSwitch is used only to ensure network connectivity. Do not modify or delete the configurations of the vSwitch. Any changes to the configurations may adversely affect the network connectivity and proper running of the jobs.	flinktest
   Workspace settings	Workspace Name	The workspace name. The name must be 1 to 60 characters in length and can contain only lowercase letters, digits, and hyphens (-). The name must start with a lowercase letter and cannot end with a hyphen (-). Important The workspace name must be unique across all Alibaba Cloud accounts and in all regions. If the name is already in use, an alert will appear below the field to advise you to choose a different name. Once a workspace is created, the workspace name cannot be changed.	flinktestnamespace
   	Quota Ceiling	The maximum number of compute resources available to the pay-as-you-go workspace. Modify the value as needed. Default value: 1000 CUs. Maximum value: 9999999 CUs. Note Each workspace requires two additional CUs as management resources for its development console and other necessary components. These management resources are automatically provisioned, eliminating the need for manual configuration. For more information, see Billable items.	100
   Storage settings	OSS Bucket	The OSS bucket associated with the workspace. It is used to store data, such as checkpoints, savepoints, logs, and JAR packages. For the content of each directory in an OSS bucket, see Manage artifacts. Important Before associating an OSS bucket with your Flink workspace, read the Precautions section of this topic carefully. When Deployment model is set to Cross zone, OSS configurations will be verified to display only buckets of the ZRS redundancy type in the drop-down list. After the Flink workspace is created, you cannot change the OSS bucket.	flink-test-oss
   Tags and tag values		A tag consists of a tag key and a tag value. Tags are used to identify cloud resources. Tags allow you to categorize, search for, and aggregate cloud resources that have the same characteristics from different dimensions. This helps you manage cloud resources in an efficient manner. You can manage tags on the Tag page of the Resource Management console.	N/A
   Monitoring service	Monitoring service	You can select Free monitoring service or Pay-as-you-go Prometheus monitoring service. For information about their differences, see Feature comparison between CloudMonitor and ARMS. Free monitoring service: After the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace is created, CloudMonitor provides basic monitoring and alerting service. For more information, see Free quotas. Pay-as-you-go Prometheus monitoring service: After the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink workspace is created, ARMS is automatically activated to provide the commercial edition of Managed Service for Prometheus. For more information about the billing of the Prometheus service, see Billing.	Free monitoring service

5. Select the Service Agreement, click Confirm Order, and complete the payment.

   After you complete the payment, click Console. On the page that appears, you can view the workspace that is being created. In general, the creation takes 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

Next steps

After a Flink workspace is created, perform the following operations as needed.

References

• What do I do if an activated workspace is not displayed in the Realtime Compute for Apache Flink console?

• Can I change the name of a workspace?

• Can I change the VPC and vSwitch of an instance?