[jira] [Created] (HADOOP-8597) FsShell's Text command should be able to read avro data files

["Harsh J (JIRA)" <ji...@apache.org>]

Harsh J created HADOOP-8597:
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             Summary: FsShell's Text command should be able to read avro data files
                 Key: HADOOP-8597
                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/HADOOP-8597
             Project: Hadoop Common
          Issue Type: New Feature
          Components: fs
    Affects Versions: 2.0.0-alpha
            Reporter: Harsh J


Similar to SequenceFiles are Apache Avro's DataFiles. Since these are getting popular as a data format, perhaps it would be useful if {{fs -text}} were to add some support for reading it, like it reads SequenceFiles. Should be easy since Avro is already a dependency and provides the required classes.

Of discussion is the output we ought to emit. Avro DataFiles aren't simple as text, nor have they the singular Key-Value pair structure of SequenceFiles. They usually contain a set of fields defined as a record, and the usual text emit, as available from avro-tools via http://avro.apache.org/docs/current/api/java/org/apache/avro/tool/DataFileReadTool.html, is in proper JSON format.

I think we should use the JSON format as the output, rather than a delimited form, for there are many complex structures in Avro and JSON is the easiest and least-work-to-do way to display it (Avro supports json dumping by itself).

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