Thx, now I get it - so the difference between the something and the gateway is that something would be an actual MQTT subscriber, while gateway is actually just

Thx, now I get it - so the difference between the something and the gateway is that something would be an actual MQTT subscriber, while gateway is actually just a facade implementing the MQTT protocol backed by Kafka. Sounds neat, but I suspect conforming to the MQTT specs but not actually being a 'full' broker might be easier said than done... Basically it will have to simulate MQTT behaviour while actually living by the Kafka rules.