Introducing Aiven for PostgreSQL® change data capture

PostgreSQL captures changes in data through change data capture (CDC), a set of software design patterns that determine and track the data that has changed. It uses built-in functionality for this in the form of a write-ahead log (WAL) that records all the changes made to the database. CDC can be achieved via logical decoding, which refers to the process of decoding the contents of the WAL into an application-specific form such as SQL statements. Another approach is using a streaming platform like Apache Kafka with Debezium, an open-source software that captures data changes in PostgreSQL and streams them to applications or messaging systems. These methods allow for efficient tracking and processing of changed data while minimizing the impact on the source database's performance.