Apache Taxonomy: A Comprehensive Guide to Apache’s Diverse Range of Tools
Apache is a software foundation that develops and maintains various open-source software tools used in different industries. In this blog post, we will explore Apache’s taxonomy of products. We will list each tool in these categories, giving a brief description of what they do.

The categories for Apache products are:
Development and Build Tools
IoT and Edge Computing
Security
Data Processing and Analytics
Big Data and Distributed Computing
Database and Data Storage
Messaging and Communication
Integration and Messaging
Web and Application Servers
Development and Build Tools
Apache’s Development and Build Tools category includes various tools that help developers create and maintain software projects. The tools listed in this category are:
Airflow: A platform used to create, schedule, and monitor workflows.
Ant: A Java-based build tool used to automate software build processes.
Arrow: A columnar memory format that enables fast data sharing between various tools.
Bigtop: A tool used to build, test, and package Big Data components.
Bloodhound: A web-based project management tool used to track issues and bugs.
Celix: A C++ runtime framework used for creating modular applications.
Cordova: A platform used to build mobile applications using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
EasyAnt: A build system used to automate software build processes.
Groovy: A dynamic programming language that runs on the Java Virtual Machine (JVM).
Hadoop: A software framework used to store and process Big Data in a distributed environment.
JMeter: A tool used to test the performance of web applications.
Libcloud: A Python library used to interact with various cloud service providers.
Log4j: A Java-based logging utility used to log application messages.
Maven: A build automation tool used primarily for Java projects.
NetBeans: An Integrated Development Environment (IDE) used to develop software applications.
POI: A Java-based library used to read and write Microsoft Office file formats.
Serf: A decentralized solution for cluster membership, failure detection, and orchestration.
SkyWalking: A distributed tracing system used to monitor and diagnose distributed systems.
Subversion: A version control system used to manage source code.
Thrift: A software framework used to develop scalable and cross-language services.
Velocity: A Java-based template engine used to generate HTML, XML, and other text-based formats.
Xalan: A Java-based library used to transform XML documents using XSLT.
Xerces: A Java-based library used to parse XML documents.
IoT and Edge Computing
The IoT and Edge Computing category includes various tools used to manage and analyze data collected from IoT devices. The tools listed in this category are:
Brooklyn: A tool used to manage distributed applications and services.
Celix: A C++ runtime framework used for creating modular applications.
CloudStack: An Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) platform used to manage virtualized environments.
Cordova: A platform used to build mobile applications using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
DeviceMap: A tool used to classify and identify devices based on their characteristics.
Edgent: A platform used to process and analyze data from IoT devices at the edge.
IoTDB: A time-series database used to store and manage data collected from IoT devices.
Libcloud: A Python library used to interact with various cloud service providers.
Security
Apache offers a wide range of software tools for various purposes, including security. In this blog post, we’ll take a closer look at the Apache products that fall under the Security category. Here are the tools listed under this category:
Accumulo: A distributed key/value store built on top of Apache Hadoop and designed to handle massive amounts of structured and semi-structured data.
Knox: A secure gateway for accessing Apache Hadoop clusters.
Metron: A real-time, extensible, and scalable platform for cyber security analytics.
Ranger: A comprehensive security framework for Apache Hadoop that provides fine-grained access control and auditing for various Hadoop components.
Santuario: A Java library for XML Signature and XML Encryption.
Sentry: A system for enforcing fine-grained role-based access control to data stored on Apache Hadoop clusters.
Shiro: A powerful and easy-to-use Java security framework that provides comprehensive security services for various applications and systems.
Data Processing and Analytics tools in Apache Products Taxonomy:
This section covers a variety of data processing and analytics tools, each with their own unique features and capabilities.
Airflow: A platform used to programmatically author, schedule, and monitor workflows.
Arrow: A cross-language development platform for in-memory data.
Atlas: A scalable and extensible set of core foundational governance services.
Avro: A data serialization system that provides compact, fast, binary data format.
Beam: A unified programming model for batch and streaming data processing pipelines.
Crunch: A simple and efficient way to write and execute distributed data processing pipelines.
Drill: A schema-free SQL query engine for Big Data.
Druid: A high-performance, column-oriented, distributed data store.
Falcon: A data management and processing platform.
Flink: A streaming dataflow engine that supports batch processing.
Giraph: A distributed graph processing system.
Hadoop: A framework for distributed storage and processing of large datasets.
Hama: A distributed computing framework based on BSP (Bulk Synchronous Parallel) computing techniques.
Hive: A data warehouse infrastructure that provides data summarization and ad hoc querying.
Jena: A framework for building Semantic Web applications.
Kylin: A distributed analytics engine that provides SQL interface and OLAP analysis.
Oozie: A workflow scheduler system to manage Apache Hadoop jobs.
Pig: A high-level platform for creating MapReduce programs used with Apache Hadoop.
Pinot: A real-time distributed OLAP datastore.
S4: A general-purpose, distributed, scalable, fault-tolerant, pluggable platform.
SPARKLIS: A SPARQL query engine based on Apache Spark.
Samza: A distributed stream processing framework.
Spark: A fast and general engine for large-scale data processing.
Sqoop: A tool designed to efficiently transfer bulk data between Apache Hadoop and structured datastores.
Superset: A modern, enterprise-ready business intelligence web application.
Tajo: A distributed data warehouse system for big data.
Tez: A framework for building high-performance batch and interactive data processing applications.
Unomi: An open-source customer data platform.
Zeppelin: A web-based notebook that enables interactive data analytics.
Big Data and Distributed Computing
The Big Data and Distributed Computing category is one of the most active areas in Apache’s development community. The tools in the Big Data and Distributed Computing category are as follows:
Accumulo: A scalable and secure distributed key/value store based on Google’s Bigtable.
Ambari: A web-based tool for provisioning, managing, and monitoring Apache Hadoop clusters.
Arrow: A cross-language development platform for in-memory data.
Atlas: A scalable and extensible set of core foundational governance services for data governance.
Avro: A data serialization system that provides efficient data encoding and decoding.
Beam: A unified programming model for batch and streaming data processing.
Bigtop: A project for packaging, testing, and configuring the Hadoop ecosystem.
BookKeeper: A scalable, fault-tolerant, and low-latency storage service optimized for real-time workloads.
Cassandra: A distributed NoSQL database designed to handle large amounts of data across many commodity servers.
CloudStack: An open-source cloud computing software for creating and managing cloud infrastructure.
Crail: A high-performance distributed data store for machine learning and analytics workloads.
Crunch: A Java library for writing, testing, and running MapReduce pipelines.
Drill: A distributed SQL query engine for big data.
Druid: A real-time analytics data store designed for sub-second OLAP queries on large-scale data.
Edgent: A programming model and runtime for edge devices.
Falcon: A data processing and management system for Hadoop.
Flink: A distributed processing system for stream and batch data processing.
Flume: A distributed, reliable, and available system for efficiently collecting, aggregating, and moving large amounts of log data.
Geode: A distributed, in-memory database for transactional applications needing low latency, high concurrency, and strong consistency.
Giraph: A large-scale graph processing system for big data.
Gora: A framework for in-memory data storage and persistence.
HBase: A distributed, scalable, big data store based on Apache Hadoop.
HCatalog: A table and storage management layer for Hadoop.
Hadoop: A distributed computing platform for processing big data.
Hama: A distributed computing framework based on Bulk Synchronous Parallel computing techniques.
Helix: A cluster management framework for distributed systems.
Heron: A real-time, distributed, and fault-tolerant stream processing engine.
Hive: A data warehouse infrastructure that provides data summarization and ad-hoc querying.
Hivemall: A library that provides various machine learning algorithms that can be executed on Apache Hive.
Ignite: A distributed in-memory computing platform that supports data processing and storage.
Impala: A massively parallel processing SQL engine for Apache Hadoop.
IoTDB: A database system designed for managing time series data generated by IoT devices.
Kafka: A distributed streaming platform that enables the processing of streams of records in real-time.
Kylin: A distributed analytics engine that provides OLAP capabilities for big data.
Mahout: A distributed machine learning library that provides various algorithms for data mining and collaborative filtering.
Mesos: A distributed systems kernel that abstracts CPU, memory, storage, and other resources.
Metron: A real-time, scalable, and extensible platform for cybersecurity data analysis.
Mnemonic: A non-volatile memory library for managing large data sets.
NiFi: An easy-to-use, powerful, and reliable data flow system that enables the automation of data movement between systems.
ORC: A file format for Hadoop that provides a highly efficient way to store and process structured data.
Oozie: A workflow scheduler system that manages Apache Hadoop jobs.
Parquet: A columnar storage format that provides a highly efficient way to store and process structured data.
Phoenix: A relational database layer on top of Apache HBase that provides SQL-like querying capabilities.
Pig: A high-level platform for creating MapReduce programs that are used for analyzing large data sets.
Pinot: A distributed, real-time analytics platform that provides low-latency data ingestion, querying, and aggregation.
PredictionIO: An open-source machine learning server that provides a simple API for developers to build and deploy predictive applications.
Pulsar: A distributed pub-sub messaging platform that provides low-latency messaging and event-driven computing capabilities.
REEF: A framework for developing and executing Big Data applications on YARN.
Ratis: A library that provides a replicated state machine implementation.
Rya: A scalable RDF triple store that supports SPARQL queries.
S2Graph: A distributed graph database that supports large-scale graph processing.
S4: A distributed stream processing platform that provides a scalable and fault-tolerant way to process data streams.
SPARKLIS: A distributed knowledge graph platform that provides efficient storage and querying of RDF data.
Samza: A distributed stream processing framework that provides fault-tolerant processing of data streams.
SkyWalking: An observability and tracing platform for distributed systems.
Spark: A fast and general-purpose cluster computing system for Big Data processing.
Sqoop: A tool for transferring data between Apache Hadoop and relational databases.
Storm: A distributed real-time stream processing system that provides fast and reliable data processing.
SystemML: A declarative machine learning platform that provides a scalable way to execute machine learning algorithms.
Tajo: A SQL-on-Hadoop engine designed for low-latency and large-scale data processing.
Tez: A data processing framework that is optimized for complex DAGs of tasks on Apache Hadoop.
ZooKeeper: A distributed coordination service that is used to manage and coordinate distributed systems.
Database and Data Storage
Apache’s Database and Data Storage category offers a vast range of tools that can help organizations store, manage, and query data efficiently, from distributed storage systems to NoSQL databases, graph databases, and more. Whether you’re looking for a tool to handle large amounts of structured data or work with content repositories, there’s likely an Apache tool that can help you achieve your goals.
Accumulo — A scalable, distributed key-value store that is built on top of Apache Hadoop.
BookKeeper — A distributed storage system that provides durable, fault-tolerant storage for streaming data.
Cassandra — A highly scalable NoSQL database that is designed to handle large amounts of data across many commodity servers.
Cayenne — A Java-based framework for building object-relational mapping (ORM) applications.
Chemistry — A set of Java libraries for working with content repositories that implement the Content Management Interoperability Services (CMIS) standard.
CouchDB — A document-oriented NoSQL database that uses JSON to store data.
Crail — A distributed storage system that is optimized for high-speed data processing.
DB — A relational database management system (RDBMS) that provides a SQL interface to store and query data.
Druid — A column-oriented, distributed data store that is designed for OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) queries.
Geode — A distributed in-memory data grid that provides low latency, high concurrency access to data.
Gora — A framework for mapping data between in-memory data models and various data storage technologies.
HBase — A distributed, column-oriented database that is designed to handle large amounts of structured data.
HCatalog — A table and storage management service that provides a centralized metadata repository for data stored in Apache Hadoop.
Ignite — An in-memory computing platform that provides distributed caching and processing capabilities.
IoTDB — A timeseries database that is designed for Internet of Things (IoT) data.
ORC — A columnar storage format that provides high compression rates and fast query performance.
OpenJPA — A Java-based ORM framework that provides persistence support for Java applications.
Parquet — A columnar storage format that is optimized for efficient data storage and processing.
Phoenix — A SQL layer for Apache HBase that provides low latency queries on HBase data.
Ratis — A Java-based, distributed consensus algorithm that provides fault tolerance and high availability.
Rya — A scalable RDF triple store that is designed for processing and storing semantic data.
S2Graph — A distributed, graph-based database that is designed for managing large-scale graph data.
ShardingSphere — A distributed, database sharding middleware that provides horizontal scaling and database fragmentation.
Sqoop — A tool for importing and exporting data between Hadoop and relational databases.
Tephra — A transaction manager for Apache HBase that provides atomicity, consistency, isolation, and durability (ACID) guarantees.
TinkerPop — A graph computing framework that provides a unified interface for working with graph databases.
ZooKeeper — A centralized service for maintaining configuration information, naming, and providing distributed synchronization.
Messaging and Communication
Apache offers a diverse set of messaging and communication tools that can help developers and organizations manage and process large volumes of data, securely communicate with remote users, and build real-time data pipelines and streaming applications.
Flume — A distributed, reliable, and available system for efficiently collecting, aggregating, and moving large amounts of log data from many different sources to a centralized data store.
Guacamole — A clientless remote desktop gateway that supports standard protocols like VNC, RDP, and SSH.
Helix — A generic cluster management framework used for the automatic management of partitions and resources in distributed systems.
Heron — A real-time, distributed, fault-tolerant stream processing engine developed at Twitter.
James — An enterprise mail server that is scalable, secure, and feature-rich.
Kafka — A distributed streaming platform used for building real-time data pipelines and streaming applications.
MINA — A network application framework that helps users develop high-performance and scalable network applications.
OpenMeetings — A browser-based video conferencing and collaboration software that supports multiple video conferencing protocols and allows users to collaborate on documents and media.
Pulsar — A distributed pub-sub messaging system that can scale horizontally without any downtime.
Qpid — A messaging framework that implements the Advanced Message Queuing Protocol (AMQP) and provides a message broker that supports multiple messaging protocols.
Storm — A distributed real-time computation system used for processing large streams of data.
Integration and Messaging
Apache’s Integration and Messaging category offers a wide range of tools that can help organizations integrate data from various sources, manage and monitor Hadoop clusters, and build scalable and efficient microservices. Whether you’re looking for a tool to automate your data flow, build web services, or manage your application deployments, there’s likely an Apache tool that can help you achieve your goals.
Airflow — A platform to programmatically author, schedule, and monitor workflows. It is commonly used for data processing pipelines.
Ambari — A web-based tool for managing, monitoring, and provisioning Apache Hadoop clusters.
Atlas — A scalable and extensible set of core foundational governance services that enables enterprises to effectively and efficiently meet their compliance requirements within Hadoop and allows integration with other tools.
Avro — A data serialization system that provides rich data structures, a compact binary format, and a container file format to store and transmit data.
Beam — A unified programming model for both batch and streaming data processing.
Brooklyn — A framework for modeling, deploying, and managing applications through reusable, composable blueprints.
CXF — A framework for building web services, including support for multiple protocols, data bindings, and transports.
Camel — A versatile integration framework that provides over 300 components and connectors to integrate various systems and data sources.
Geronimo — An open-source JavaEE application server that supports the latest JavaEE specifications.
ManifoldCF — A framework for connecting to multiple content repositories and performing content transformations.
NiFi — A data flow tool that helps automate the movement and transformation of data between systems.
ODE — An open-source BPEL engine that executes business processes written in the BPEL standard.
ServiceComb — A microservices framework that provides service registration, discovery, and governance capabilities.
ServiceMix — An open-source ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) that provides a messaging backbone for connecting different applications and services.
Thrift — A scalable and cross-language framework for building distributed systems.
Web and Application Servers
Apache’s Web and Application Servers category includes an extensive range of tools that provide support for building, managing, and deploying web applications. These tools offer a broad range of functionalities, from clientless remote desktop gateway to cloud computing infrastructure software platforms. The open-source nature of these tools allows developers to modify, extend and integrate them into their projects to meet their specific needs. Here is a list of Apache’s 26 Web and Application Servers, along with a brief description of each tool.
Ambari: A tool for managing, monitoring, and provisioning Apache Hadoop clusters.
Bloodhound: An issue tracking and project management system.
Brooklyn: A tool for modeling, deploying, and managing distributed applications.
CXF: A framework for building web services using various protocols such as SOAP, REST, and XML.
Camel: A routing and mediation engine that provides a powerful API for integrating different systems.
CloudStack: A cloud computing infrastructure software platform for creating and managing public, private, and hybrid cloud environments.
Cocoon: A framework for building XML-based web applications.
DeltaSpike: A suite of portable CDI (Contexts and Dependency Injection) extensions for Java SE and EE.
Directory: An LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) server that provides authentication, authorization, and other directory-related services.
Falcon: A tool for managing data pipelines in Apache Hadoop.
Forrest: A publishing framework for building static and dynamic websites.
Geronimo: A Java EE application server that provides a platform for deploying Java web applications.
Guacamole: A clientless remote desktop gateway that supports standard protocols like VNC, RDP, and SSH.
HTTP Server: Apache’s flagship web server that powers a significant portion of the internet.
Helix: A cluster management framework that simplifies the task of managing large-scale distributed systems.
Karaf: A lightweight container for running OSGi (Open Service Gateway Initiative) applications.
MyFaces: A JSF (JavaServer Faces) implementation that provides a framework for building user interfaces.
Olingo: A Java library for building OData (Open Data Protocol) clients and servers.
OpenMeetings: A web-based video conferencing and collaboration tool.
Portals: A framework for building enterprise portals and content management systems.
ServiceComb: A microservices framework that provides service discovery, registration, and governance.
ServiceMix: An ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) that provides a platform for integrating different systems.
Stratos: A cloud computing platform that provides support for creating and managing PaaS (Platform as a Service) environments.
Struts: A web application framework for building Java web applications.
Tapestry: A component-based web application framework for building Java web applications.
Tomcat: A Java-based web server that provides support for running Java web applications.