Is there any specific reason to retain more than 5 back ups of snapshot and corresponding log files in zookeeper?

[#1 · Accepted solution]

The autopurge.snapRetainCount configuration setting is described here.

https://zookeeper.apache.org/doc/r3.4.8/zookeeperAdmin.html#sc_advancedConfiguration

Old snapshots/logs represent earlier points in time for the state saved in a ZooKeeper cluster, similar to a backup. Tuning the autopurge.snapRetainCount represents a trade-off between disk space consumption and flexibility to restore back to earlier points in time.

In practice, I have not needed to restore state to an earlier point in time like this. Typical applications of ZooKeeper use it for transient coordination data that can be recreated from first principles easily in the event of a disaster, so going back to an earlier point in time generally isn't very important. For that reason, I haven't needed to tune up the retention count.

[#2]

Thanks for your reply @Chris Nauroth