What is an Index Block in an SSTable?

An Index Block is a section within an SSTable that maps key ranges to the specific data block containing them, letting RocksDB jump directly to the right location instead of scanning the whole file.

• Acts like a table of contents for the data blocks inside that SSTable
• Loaded into memory, often cached, so lookups within it are fast
• Used together with a Bloom filter, the filter first rules out files that definitely don't contain the key, then the index block locates exactly where to look within a file that might

Without an index block, finding a specific key inside an SSTable would require scanning through data sequentially rather than jumping straight to the relevant section.

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