--- title: "Overview" slug: "dev-start-overview" updated: 2026-10-30T18:18:46Z published: 2026-10-30T18:18:46Z canonical: "docs.vastdata.com/dev-start-overview" --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vastdata.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Overview *Applies to VAST Cluster 5.5.* These docs are for developers, data engineers and data scientists who **build on** the VAST cluster: write applications, pipelines and queries against its services. They cover six services, each in its own section, and are written for VAST Cluster 5.5. ## These docs and the KB The [VAST knowledge base](/docs-5-5/docs/vast-database) (KB) answers "how do I enable, configure or operate this on the cluster". These docs answer "how do I build with this". Enabling a service, creating views, users, keys and policies, and other admin procedures are tasks for your platform team, so these pages link to the KB for them instead of repeating them. Each service section has a setup or access page that lists what to ask for; [get access](/develop/docs/dev-start-get-access) brings them together. Links to the KB go to kb.vastdata.com and leave these docs. ## The six services - **[VAST DataBase](/develop/docs/dev-database-overview)** is a transactional database for tables, built into the VAST cluster, which you work with from the Python SDK, Trino, Spark or the VAST Query Engine. - **[VAST Vector Search](/develop/docs/dev-vector-search-overview)** is nearest-neighbour search over embeddings stored in VAST DataBase tables: a vector is a column type, and you search with SQL through the VAST Query Engine. - **[VAST Event Broker](/develop/docs/dev-event-broker-overview)** is a Kafka-compatible event broker built into VAST Cluster, where each topic is stored as a VAST DataBase table. - **[VAST DataEngine](/develop/docs/dev-dataengine-overview)** runs your Python functions on Kubernetes when something happens to your data on the cluster, or on a schedule. - **[VAST DataStore](/develop/docs/dev-datastore-overview)** is the file and object storage of a VAST cluster, which applications reach over S3, NFS and SMB. - **[VAST Catalog](/develop/docs/dev-catalog-overview)** is a table of metadata about the files, objects and directories on your cluster; the same section covers the audit log, a table of the protocol operations clients performed. ![Six services on one cluster. VAST DataBase: tables, reached with the Python SDK, Trino, Spark and the VAST Query Engine over ADBC. VAST Vector Search: vector columns and indexes on VAST DataBase tables, searched through the Query Engine over ADBC or the SDK's vector_search(). VAST Event Broker: Kafka-compatible topics, reached with Kafka clients, and topics can be queried as tables. VAST DataEngine: functions and pipelines that run on events, managed with the vastde CLI and YAML. VAST DataStore: files and objects over S3, NFS and SMB, reached with boto3, the AWS CLI, s3fs, PyArrow and NFS mounts. VAST Catalog and the audit log: system tables about files and operations, queried with the SDK, Trino or Spark. Every service is set up the same way: an endpoint from a virtual IP pool, a VAST user, S3 access keys and an identity policy.](https://cdn.us.document360.io/89b91113-5dc6-49db-86ec-57b16dc8ce56/Images/Documentation/start-services-map.svg?sv=2026-02-06&spr=https&st=2026-11-08T08%3A54%3A24Z&se=2026-11-08T09%3A54%3A24Z&sr=c&sp=r&sig=2fkhdY1jOb9EFkm50gkWrZx%2F1sdMcEirDLhOSot1duo%3D) *Six services on one cluster, and the clients that reach them.* Not sure which one you need? See [choose a service](/develop/docs/dev-start-choose-a-service). For which client reaches which service, see [choose a client](/develop/docs/dev-start-choose-a-client). ## How each service section is organised Every service section has the same parts, in the same order in the navigation. It opens with its own pages, then its folders: | Part | What it holds | | --- | --- | | **Overview and Quickstart** | What the service is, what it's for and what to watch for, and a quickstart you can paste and run in about 10 to 15 minutes. | | **Concepts** and **Architecture** | The objects you work with and how they behave, and how the cluster runs them. VAST DataBase has an Architecture folder with several pages. | | **Release notes** | What each 5.5 release changed, in the sections that have them. | | **Guides** | Task-by-task pages, each with runnable code. | | **Best practices** | Recommendations for particular workloads. | | **Integrations** | Clients, tools and patterns that connect the service to other systems. | | **Reference** | Schemas, settings, compatibility and limits, for looking things up. | | **Operations** | What to ask your platform team for (setup or access) and CI/CD and automation, plus security, performance or monitoring where the service needs them. | | **Troubleshooting** | Symptoms, causes and fixes, and error messages you can search for. | Each overview ends with a "What's in this section" (or "How to read these docs") list that links every page. ## Conventions you'll meet - **"Applies to VAST Cluster 5.5."** Every page states the cluster release it's written for, under its title. Pages that use the VAST DataBase Python SDK also name the SDK version their examples use. See [what's new and versions](/develop/docs/dev-start-whats-new). - **Expected output under code blocks.** In quickstarts and guides, the code blocks run in order, and below each one is the output you should see, captured from a 5.5 cluster. Values such as versions, names and times depend on your cluster; the page says so where it matters. Where a block isn't meant to be run on its own, or its output hasn't been captured yet, its first line says so. - **"Admin task: send to your platform team."** A step marked like this is done by your platform team, not by you. It's followed by links to the KB procedure, and often by a request you can copy and send. - **Draft pages.** A page marked as a draft is under review and may change. ## Where to start 1. [Choose a service](/develop/docs/dev-start-choose-a-service) for what you want to build. If it spans several services, see [end-to-end patterns](/develop/docs/dev-start-end-to-end-patterns), or [solutions](/develop/docs/dev-start-solutions) for VAST's AI Factory, cyber lakehouse, analytics and real-time event plays. 2. [Get access](/develop/docs/dev-start-get-access): send your platform team the request on that service's setup or access page. 3. Run that service's quickstart, linked from [choose a service](/develop/docs/dev-start-choose-a-service). 4. [Choose a client](/develop/docs/dev-start-choose-a-client) for the language or engine you'll build with. 5. Check [what's new and versions](/develop/docs/dev-start-whats-new) for your cluster's release and the client versions that go with it.