Explain the ELK Stack.
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Quick Answer
ELK is Elasticsearch (search and storage), Logstash (ingestion and parsing), and Kibana (visualization) — a stack for centralizing, searching, and visualizing logs. Beats (e.g., Filebeat) often ship the logs.
Detailed Answer
Logs flow from Beats/Logstash into Elasticsearch where they are indexed for fast search, then Kibana explores and dashboards them. It solves the distributed-logging problem: correlating events across many services in one place. At scale, watch index sizing, retention/ILM, and Elasticsearch resource needs.
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Interview Tip
Add Beats to the ELK trio and mention retention/index management — the operational reality of running it.
elkloggingelasticsearch