datafeed

A datafeed, or data feed, is a mechanism for delivering data from a source system to one or more consuming applications. Data can be real-time or near real-time, batched daily, or tuned to a fixed interval. Feeds are typically continuous streams or scheduled transfers, and may be push-based (the provider sends data to subscribers) or pull-based (consumers request data).

Feeds use various protocols and formats, including REST or WebSocket endpoints, FTP/SFTP, or message-oriented systems such as Kafka, MQTT, or JMS. Common data formats include JSON, XML, CSV, or domain-specific encodings. Data feeds are often governed by contracts or SLAs that specify latency, reliability, throughput, and access permissions.

Common domains include financial market data feeds that transmit price quotes and trades; enterprise data feeds that propagate customer or product records between systems; IoT feeds that stream sensor readings; and content, news, or social media feeds that syndicate updates.

Key properties of a useful datafeed include timeliness, completeness, correctness, and consistency. Operational considerations include error handling, retries, deduplication, ordering guarantees, and security. Data feeds are central to data integration, analytics pipelines, and real-time decision making, and are often implemented as part of larger data platforms or event-driven architectures.