If your cluster includes some nodes authentication through Kerberos, while others employ LDAP authentication, you can configure your network load balancer to forward both kinds of requests to a data node that is set up with the appropriate authentication type. Once the initial request is made using either Kerberos or LDAP authentication, Impala automatically handles the process of coordinating the work across multiple nodes and transmitting intermediate results back to the coordinator node.

This technique is most suitable for larger clusters, where you are already using load balancing software for high availability. You configure Impala to run on a different port on the nodes configured for LDAP. Then you configure the load balancing software to forward Kerberos connection requests to nodes using the default port, and LDAP connection requests to nodes using an alternative port for LDAP. Consult the documentation for your load balancing software for how to configure that type of forwarding.