What is Stream Processing

The number of tools available for Big Data processing have grown exponentially as cloud providers have introduced solutions for businesses that have little or no money for capital expenditures. The chapter starts by discussing historic data tools and the evolution to those of today. With Cloud Computing, the need for upfront costs has been removed, costs are continuing to fall and costs can be negotiated. This chapter reviews the current types of Big Data tools, and how they evolved. To give readers an idea of costs, the chapter shows example costs (in today's market) for a sampling of the tools and relative cost comparisons of the other tools like the Grid tools used by the government, scientific communities and academic communities. Readers will take away from this chapter an understanding of what tools work best for several scenarios and how to select cost effective tools (even tools that are unknown today).