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This is a backward compatible change.

Rejected Alternatives

Add an abort() call which close producer forcefully. Leave the close() as is (KAFKA-1659)This is a viable solution but does not provide easy solution to a time bounded shutdown. As quoting from KAFKA-1660 commented by Andrew Stein.

" I don't think that this (the request for producer.close(timeout)) and KAFKA-1659 (the request for producer.abort()) are the same.

If producer.close(timeout) were to return without actually closing the producer in time, the user could then continue with producer.abort(). However, this would not be the only case where producer.abort() would be useful. It could be used if a producer.send() were to fail or if a future.get() were to fail as well.

In addition if producer.close() were to return without actually closing the producer in time, the user could continue with other logic besides producer.abort(). "

We decided to merge the abort() into producer.close(timeout) to avoid adding another interface.None