Hey Sam, *The improvements in CEP-21 <https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CASSANDRA/CEP-21%3A+Transactional+Cluster+Metadata> look awesome.* I am currently running Cassandra 4.1 and plan to upgrade to 5.x in the future, where CEP-21 has been implemented. I have a few questions:
1. I am using the single-token architecture, where operators set the token for every node by explicitly configuring the initial_token field in cassandra.yaml. There should be no conflict between this setup and CEP-21, correct? My understanding suggests it is compatible, but I’d like to confirm it to be safe. 2. In the CEP, you provided a detailed explanation and examples of the bootstrap and decommission flows (link <https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CASSANDRA/CEP-21%3A+Transactional+Cluster+Metadata>). Would you mind extending this to cover the flow for node replacement as well? 3. Since the Cassandra Management System (CMS) holds the source of truth for cluster topology, will there be a nodetool command to query CMS directly for this information? As operators, we often need to retrieve topology details, such as which nodes are leaving, live, joining, moving, or unreachable. Currently, this information is obtained via a JMX call to org.apache.cassandra.db:type=StorageService, which is gossip-backed. However, gossip mismatches can lead to non-deterministic results across nodes. Thanks, and I appreciate your insights! Best, Long
