Configuration

Kifa uses a three-layer configuration system:

CLI flags > Environment variables > TOML file

A setting specified as a CLI flag overrides the same setting in an environment variable, which overrides the TOML file.

Configuration File

Place kifa.toml in the data directory or specify a path with -c /path/to/config.toml.

kifa.toml

[storage]
memtable_flush_threshold_mib = 4
compaction_threshold = 4
compaction_enabled = true

[wal]
flush_mode = "cautious"
segment_size_mib = 16

[ingester]
channel_capacity = 1024

[sources]
stdin = false
files = ["~/logs/transactions.log"]
tcp = ["127.0.0.1:5514"]
udp = ["0.0.0.0:5515"]

Environment Variables

All settings can be overridden via environment variables with the KIFA_ prefix:

Variable	Description	Default
KIFA_DATA_DIR	Storage directory	Required
KIFA_FLUSH_MODE	normal, cautious, emergency	normal
KIFA_SEGMENT_SIZE_MIB	WAL segment size	16
KIFA_MEMTABLE_FLUSH_THRESHOLD_MIB	Memtable flush threshold	4
KIFA_COMPACTION_THRESHOLD	SSTable compaction trigger	4
KIFA_COMPACTION_ENABLED	Enable compaction	true
KIFA_CHANNEL_CAPACITY	Ingester buffer size	1024
KIFA_STDIN	Read from stdin	false
KIFA_FILES	Comma-separated file paths
KIFA_TCP	Comma-separated TCP addresses
KIFA_UDP	Comma-separated UDP addresses
KIFA_LOG	Log level filter (env_logger)

CLI Flags

Terminal

kifa ingest --help

Flag	Description
-d, --data-dir	Directory for WAL, SSTables, and metadata
-c, --config	Path to TOML configuration file
--flush-mode	WAL flush mode
--segment-size-mib	WAL segment size in MiB
--memtable-threshold-mib	Flush memtable after this many MiB
--compaction-threshold	Compact after this many SSTables
--no-compaction	Disable background compaction
--channel-capacity	Internal channel buffer size

CLI Reference Complete flag reference for all commands.

Configuration Reference Unified table of all settings across all layers.