Pentaho Consulting & Support

Pentaho Consulting, Support & Migration Services

Most Pentaho environments we inherit have years of undocumented Kettle/PDI logic and no clear owner. AceMQ engineers stabilize what's running, then give you an honest answer on whether to keep maintaining it or migrate off — no vendor incentive to say otherwise.

A senior engineer, not an SDR. No sales sequence attached.

Senior SMEs
11+
Emergency SLA
<15min
Customers
160+
Countries Served
26+

Without rewriting every transformation before you know which ones still matterFor production incident cover, see AceMQ Pentaho 24/7 support.

Customers

  • Microsoft
  • Henry Schein
  • Enbridge
  • Gojek

Partners

  • Broadcom
  • Redis
  • VMware Tanzu
  • OSSeva

The Problem

Why teams call us about Pentaho

Eight Pentaho problems teams bring to AceMQ, from Kettle transformations nobody documented and jobs that fail overnight with only a missing report as the signal to Carte servers built by hand and a Java runtime past its supported life. If one describes your week, that is where the review starts.

  1. 01

    Kettle transformations were written by people who have left and nothing documents what they do

  2. 02

    A job fails overnight and the only signal is a report that did not arrive in the morning

  3. 03

    The repository holds hundreds of transformations and nobody knows which are still scheduled

  4. 04

    Database credentials are embedded in transformations rather than managed centrally

  5. 05

    The Java runtime beneath the server is past its supported life and cannot be upgraded in place

  6. 06

    Carte servers were built by hand and cannot be rebuilt from anything held in version control

  7. 07

    Reports still run on a BI server that nobody in the organisation is trained to administer

  8. 08

    The subscription renewal is due and the case for keeping it has never actually been examined

A good fit if Pentaho still runs your production batch loads, on a vendor-supported version or past it, and you want senior engineers who give an honest answer on keeping or leaving and stay on a problem until the root cause is written down.

Not a fit for small teams with non-critical workloads. AceMQ is not a budget consultancy: we work with enterprises running business-critical and compliance-heavy Pentaho.

Running Pentaho in production? Get a quote from a senior engineer, answered within one hour.

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How it breaks, and the fix

What happens when a Pentaho job fails and the scheduler still says finished?

In a Pentaho job, the hop after a failed step decides what happens next. When the job carries on past the failure, the scheduler records the run as finished while the load never receives that data. The first alert is the report that did not arrive in the morning.

One failed step, a finished job

Table input, two transformations, a load and a warehouse table

Illustrative

  1. The nightly job reads the source, runs both transformations and loads the warehouse inside the batch window. Failure hops lead to an alert step, and the Carte server has the memory the row sets need.

  2. inventory.ktr fails after a JDBC driver changed underneath it. The job's hop carries on regardless, so the load never receives that data, the scheduler records the run as finished, and the gap shows up the next morning in a report.

  3. Every failure hop leads to a logged, alerting step, the driver and Java versions are pinned and tested together, and the failed transformation is re-run. A row-count check against the source confirms the load before the report runs.

A job that fails quietly is one of the reasons teams call AceMQ about Pentaho. The fix is discipline around the job, not a rewrite: failure hops on every step that route to a logged alert, error handling and dead-row capture on the steps that reject data, JDBC drivers and the Java runtime pinned and tested as a pair, row-count checks between source and target, and Carte servers that can be rebuilt from version control. AceMQ also inventories which jobs still run, since many repositories hold jobs that no longer feed anything.

Our Services

Pentaho Consulting & Services

AceMQ runs five Pentaho service lines: Kettle and PDI maintenance and hardening, batch transformation performance tuning, migration off Pentaho to modern ELT, server upgrade and license remediation, and lineage and documentation recovery. A named senior engineer leads each one, and any can roll into 24/7 support with a 15-minute emergency SLA.

  • 01

    Kettle/PDI Maintenance & Hardening

    Before touching what's next, we stabilize what's running — often years of .ktr/.kjb logic built by engineers who've since left the company.

    • Transformation and job maintenance across Spoon-authored PDI repositories, including error handling and dead-row capture hardening
    • Pentaho Server and Carte slave cluster stabilization for distributed batch execution
    • File-based to enterprise/database repository migration for version control, rollback, and multi-developer access
    • Scheduling and dependency-chain documentation for jobs with implicit, undocumented ordering
  • 02

    Batch Transformation Performance Tuning

    Large batch transformations that ran fine at last year's volume degrade silently until a nightly job blows through its window. We profile step-by-step to find the actual bottleneck.

    • Step-by-step transformation profiling to isolate slow lookups, sorts, and blocking steps in the data flow
    • JVM heap and Carte server memory tuning for transformations processing large row sets
    • Database connection pooling and commit-size tuning to reduce target database contention
    • Parallel execution and partitioning strategy for transformations that can be split across Carte slaves
  • 03

    Migration Off Pentaho to Modern ELT

    For most teams we talk to, Pentaho is a maintain-or-migrate decision, not a maintain-forever one. We help you make that call honestly, then execute without a hard cutover you can't roll back from — this is often the highest-value engagement for teams on Pentaho today.

    • Transformation-by-transformation logic mapping from Kettle/PDI to Airbyte extraction plus dbt transformation models
    • Migration path evaluation to Databricks or a modern lakehouse for teams with heavy batch compute requirements
    • Parallel-run validation comparing legacy Pentaho output against the new pipeline before decommissioning
    • Phased migration sequencing that keeps critical nightly jobs running throughout the transition
  • 04

    Pentaho Server Upgrade & License Remediation

    Pentaho's licensing and support changes have left some Pentaho customers without a clear support path. We stabilize the platform you have while you decide what's next.

    • Pentaho Server version upgrade planning and compatibility testing for teams not ready to migrate off the platform
    • License and support-gap remediation for deployments affected by Pentaho's licensing and end-of-life changes
    • Security patching and CVE remediation for out-of-support Pentaho Server versions
    • 24/7 break/fix support for production Pentaho batch failures, with a named engineer on every ticket
  • 05

    Data Lineage & Documentation Recovery

    Undocumented Pentaho flows are the single most common blocker to any decision about Pentaho's future. We reverse-engineer the logic and produce documentation your team can actually use.

    • Transformation and job dependency mapping to reconstruct undocumented data lineage across your ETL estate
    • Source-to-target field mapping documentation for compliance and audit requirements
    • Identification of dead, duplicated, or orphaned jobs no longer feeding downstream systems
    • Prioritized findings report to inform your maintain-vs-migrate decision
  • 15 MIN SLA

    24/7 Pentaho Support

    Named senior engineers on your account — 15-minute emergency response, no ticket routing, no junior triage.

    • 15-minute emergency response SLA
    • Named engineer, zero cold-start
    • Proactive CVE & health monitoring
    • Quarterly deployment reviews
    Compare the four Pentaho support tiers

Want AceMQ to take this off your team's plate? Tell us about your Pentaho estate.

Contact Us

24/7 Support

Pentaho Support When It Matters Most

AceMQ Pentaho support gives you a named senior engineer and a 15-minute first response when a production batch job or Pentaho Server fails, 24/7, on current versions and on versions the vendor no longer supports. Lower severities get 1-hour, 4-hour and next-day responses, and every P1 ends with a written root-cause analysis.

  1. 15 minfirst responseEmergencyProduction down, messages not flowing, queue manager failure
  2. 1 hourfirst responseCriticalSevere degradation, high error rates, approaching capacity
  3. 4 hoursfirst responseHighPerformance issues, configuration problems, non-critical failures
  4. Next Dayfirst responseStandardQuestions, guidance, best practices, non-urgent improvements

P1 escalation path

A replay of one P1, from the first page to the written root-cause analysis

SLA 15:00
T+Elapsed15:00
Engineer on your bridge

15-minute P1 response, 24/7.
A response time, not a resolution time.

  1. T+00:00

    P1 opened, on-call engineer paged

    Phone, email or Slack reaches the on-call senior engineer directly, whether the incident is in RabbitMQ, Kafka, Redis, PostgreSQL or Kubernetes. No web form, no tier-1 queue.

    Paged
  2. T+15:00

    Senior engineer on your bridge

    A senior engineer who already knows your environment joins a live bridge, so nobody has to re-explain your topology.

    Live
  3. T+30:00

    Specialists across the stack join

    When an incident crosses components, the engineers who know each one join. For RabbitMQ, the path runs to the core team.

    If needed
  4. After

    Written root-cause analysis

    Root cause, the fix applied and the prevention steps, delivered after every P1.

    Every P1

How Our Support Actually Works

Beyond SLAs — the model behind senior-only, zero-cold-start expert access.

  • Named Engineers on Your Account

    Every ticket is handled by a senior SME assigned to your account — not a pool of anonymous agents. Zero cold-start. No re-explaining your environment.

  • Live Escalation on Any Ticket

    Any ticket can be escalated to a live session with your named engineer via calendar booking. No gatekeeping, no approval required — direct access, always.

  • Proactive Risk Mitigation

    Quarterly health checks on your deployment plus shared intelligence from 50+ support customers — we surface risks before they reach production.

  • Critical Bug & CVE Intelligence

    Proactive alerts on critical bugs and CVEs affecting your exact version, with version compliance monitoring so you're never caught off guard.

  • Commercial EOL Versions

    Commercial support for end-of-life Pentaho versions, with security fixes backported through OSSeva, so the upgrade happens on your schedule rather than the community's.

Compare Pentaho support plans

How It Works

What actually happens next

An AceMQ Pentaho engagement runs in four stages: an environment and inventory review of 1 to 2 weeks, written findings with an honest keep-or-migrate answer within a week, stabilisation and then your chosen path alongside your team, then a handover with runbooks for job failure triage and server recovery.

1–2 weeks

Environment and inventory review

We inventory the repository — which transformations and jobs still run, what they feed, where credentials live — and check the server, the Carte nodes and the Java runtime beneath them.

Within a week

Written findings and plan

What is running, what is dead, what is fragile, and an honest answer on whether to keep maintaining Pentaho or migrate off it. Written so your leadership can decide on the numbers.

Scoped per engagement

Implementation alongside your team

Monitoring and stabilisation first so failures become visible, then whichever path you choose — hardening in place, or migration one data flow at a time with the old job running until the new one matches.

Ongoing

Handover and optional cover

Runbooks for job failure triage, repository change control and server recovery, plus 24/7 support with a 15-minute emergency SLA if you want it.

  • Written findings before any change
  • Old jobs kept running until the new output matches
  • Your engineers in the room
  • You keep the runbooks
  • Ad hoc engagements or an annual partnership

A senior engineer, not an SDR. No sales sequence attached.

Customer Success

Real Pentaho Results

AceMQ case studies where Pentaho was part of the estate, from Carte cluster remediation and job failure support to lineage recovery and migration to a modern ELT stack. Each one links to the full write-up: the environment, what AceMQ assessed or changed, and the result.

1 / 4 case studies

  • Consulting

    Pentaho to Modern ELT Stack Migration

    Healthcare Payer Organization

    Planning and executing a staged move off Pentaho Data Integration onto a modern ELT stack, without a big-bang cutover of hundreds of transformations.

    PentahoAirbytedbtPostgreSQLKubernetes
    Read case study : Pentaho to Modern ELT Stack Migration
  • Remediation

    Pentaho Carte Cluster Stability Remediation

    Industrial Products Manufacturer

    Resolving Carte slave server instability where long-running clustered transformations hung, leaked memory, and left orphaned carte sessions.

    PentahoPostgreSQLDockerKubernetes
    Read case study : Pentaho Carte Cluster Stability Remediation
All use cases

Solutions

Every way AceMQ works with Pentaho.

AceMQ covers Pentaho end to end: Kettle consulting, 24/7 support and incident management, proactive monitoring, managed Pentaho on your infrastructure or on AceMQ's, support for versions past the vendor lifecycle, a fixed-price health check and migration off Pentaho.

Projects

Build, fix or move Pentaho

Fixed-scope work led by a senior engineer: architecture and new builds, a health check of what you run today, or a migration with a reversible cutover.

Support and managed services

Keep Pentaho running

Four tiers of ongoing cover once you are live. Each tier hands more of the day-to-day work to AceMQ, from a 15-minute emergency SLA to AceMQ hosting and running Pentaho for you.

Compare the four Pentaho support tiers

Side by side

Pentaho Enterprise or Community Edition: who supports what?

Pentaho Enterprise Edition comes with vendor support for versions inside the vendor's lifecycle, and Extended Support can cover some versions past it. Community Edition, including open-source PDI, has no vendor behind it. In both, jobs that break after a Java or driver patch, Carte clusters and undocumented flows stay with your team, and that is the layer AceMQ covers.

Pentaho Enterprise Edition compared with Community Edition on who supports it, version lifecycle, older versions, incidents, cost shape and exit
QuestionEnterprise Edition (vendor subscription)Community Edition (including open-source PDI)
Who supports it?The vendor, for versions inside its support lifecycle, with Extended Support sold for some versions past it.Nobody at the vendor. Help is community forums and your own skills.
How long is a version supported?Active patching until the next release of the same type, then about six months of limited support with no new patches.No published support window and no patch commitment.
What if you run Pentaho 9.x or older?Outside the vendor's standard window. It lists 10.2 and 11.0 and treats any version it does not list as unsupported.Same position. AceMQ supports older versions with workarounds and configuration-level mitigations, not new vendor patches.
Who answers a failing nightly job?Vendor support for product defects. Failures from a Java, operating system or JDBC driver change, Carte hangs and data problems stay with your team.Your team, or AceMQ: a named senior engineer, 24/7, a 15-minute emergency response and a written root-cause analysis for every P1.
What does it cost?A vendor subscription on top of your infrastructure and engineers.Your infrastructure and engineers, plus a support contract priced on the cover you need if you add one.
How do you leave?Map each transformation to its replacement, run both in parallel and cut over in phases.The same path. Apache Hop can import Kettle jobs and transformations, while Airbyte with dbt is a rewrite.

For how the Pentaho lifecycle, Extended Support and independent support fit together, read Pentaho support options: lifecycle, Extended Support or independent. For how long each project and vendor supports a version, see support windows compared across 21 technologies.

Not sure which option fits? A senior Pentaho engineer will scope it with you.

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One partner, not five

We Support Your Entire Tech Stack

Pentaho rarely fails in isolation. AceMQ covers the full surrounding infrastructure — so one team owns the whole path instead of pointing at each other.

Messaging & Streaming

Databases & Caching

Search & Analytics

Lakehouse & Compute

Observability & Monitoring

Data Integration

Cloud & Containers

API Management

VMware Tanzu

See all 51 technologies we supportShow fewer

Guides, articles and comparisons

Go deeper on Pentaho.

Guides from AceMQ engineers on the Pentaho support lifecycle, Extended Support and independent support, and on how long each project and vendor supports a version, plus the AceMQ services for the data platforms you might move to.

Related services

Ready to talk Pentaho? Get a quote or send us a message.

Contact Us

FAQs

Pentaho Questions Answered

Eight answers on Pentaho from AceMQ: the vendor lifecycle and Pentaho 9.x, who answers when a job fails, Community Edition, keeping or leaving Pentaho, jobs that break after a Java or driver patch, Carte clusters, undocumented flows, and how an engagement starts.

Still have questions about Pentaho? Email an Expert

Which Pentaho versions does the vendor still support?

Pentaho lists 10.2 and 11.0 as supported, with end of support in March 2028 or later and July 2029 or later, and treats any version it does not list as unsupported. That puts Pentaho 9.x, 8.x and 7.x outside the vendor window. AceMQ supports current versions and those older lines, using workarounds where no vendor patch exists.

Who answers when a Pentaho job fails in production, and how fast?

A named AceMQ senior engineer answers within 15 minutes, 24/7, when a production batch job that downstream systems depend on fails, on any Pentaho version. Lower severities get a first response within 1 hour, 4 hours or the next business day, and the engineer stays until the root cause is documented.

Is Pentaho Community Edition supported?

Not by the vendor. Community Edition, including the open-source PDI many teams still call Kettle, has community forums only. AceMQ supports Community Edition in production 24/7, with a named senior engineer, a 15-minute emergency response and a written root-cause analysis after every P1.

Should we keep Pentaho or migrate off it?

It depends on batch volume, how many undocumented flows you carry and how far your version is outside the vendor window. AceMQ inventories what still runs and gives a written keep-or-migrate answer on your numbers. Stable, well-understood batch can stay put for now, and many estates are better served by Airbyte with dbt or a lakehouse.

A job that ran for years suddenly fails with no Pentaho change. Why?

Usually something underneath Pentaho changed: a Java runtime or operating system patch, a replaced JDBC driver or a tightened TLS setting on the source database. Pentaho's error often points at the wrong layer. AceMQ finds the change by elimination, pins Java and driver versions as a pair, and tests them together before the next patch window.

Do you support Pentaho Server and Carte clusters?

Yes. AceMQ stabilises and tunes Carte clusters for distributed batch: load distribution, memory per Carte server, servers that hang or leak, and jobs that assume an execution order. Where servers were built by hand, we rebuild them from version control so a failed node can be replaced instead of nursed.

Can you document Pentaho flows when nobody understands them?

Yes, and it is one of our most common Pentaho engagements. AceMQ reads the .ktr and .kjb files and repository metadata to rebuild job dependencies, schedules and source-to-target mappings, flags dead and duplicate jobs, and delivers lineage documentation your team can use for audits, handover or a migration decision.

How does a Pentaho engagement start, and how do you work with our team?

It starts with a scoping call booked in our reply within 1 hour, then a 1 to 2 week review of the repository, job inventory, servers and Java runtime. Findings are written up within a week and changes are made alongside your engineers, one data flow at a time. You keep the runbooks, and ongoing support is optional.

Can we work with AceMQ on Pentaho without a long contract?

Yes. AceMQ works on Pentaho in two ways: ad hoc engagements for a defined piece of work, such as a health check, an upgrade or an incident, or an annual partner engagement that covers 24/7 support, proactive reviews and named engineers. Many teams start ad hoc and move to an annual partnership once the first engagement is done.

How much does AceMQ Pentaho support or consulting cost?

Every AceMQ proposal is tailored to your requirements: your Pentaho environment, the SLA you need, the hours of cover and the scope of work. Most contracts run $24,000–72,000 a year, depending on the SLA, the scope and how Pentaho is deployed, with aggressive discounts when several technologies share one contract. Request a quote and AceMQ replies within 1 hour.

Let's talk

Ready for an Honest Pentaho Assessment?

Whether you need emergency support, a documentation recovery project, or a migration plan off Pentaho — AceMQ staffs every engagement with a named senior engineer. Quote requests answered within 1 hour.

A senior Pentaho engineer, not a sales queueAbout your jobs, not a pitch deckQuote requests answered within 1 hour

Production incident right now?Email a Pentaho Architect

Get in Touch

Talk to a Pentaho Expert

Send us a message and we'll follow up within 1 hour — or book a free 30-min consultation directly.

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info@acemq.com
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