We have performed a complete cluster installation. It is not as difficult as it seems. Once we have fixed the variables and decided what hardware requirement is needed, it is just a matter of running a shell script that does everything. Multiple data center setups are equally simple. Many variables depend on your particular use case, but if you do not have a particular specification in mind, go with the suggested ones or the default one. They are generally good.

Setting up a cluster is probably a one-time task for an organization. It is likely that your first cluster will be just a couple of nodes. It is equally likely that you will stick with that cluster for first production, or at least till you plan to make the first release with Cassandra in your system. In production, the first couple of things that come to everyone's mind are questions such as the software is tuned to perform its best? What happens when things start to break? What if we needed to ramp up the servers? How safe is our data? Chances are that you will be expected to answer these questions. Therefore, you should know the answers before these questions are directed to you. The next few chapters are about all these questions.