A self-hosted Instana deployment team is performing the initial backend configuration and needs to specify Kafka broker addresses for span data ingestion alongside ClickHouse connection parameters for metric storage. Both configurations must be in place before the backend services can start. Where should both sets of connection parameters be specified?

In self-hosted Instana deployments, the settings.hcl file is the central configuration file for all backend infrastructure connections. Each required datastore including Kafka, ClickHouse, Cassandra, and Elasticsearch has its own dedicated configuration block within this file. The file is processed during installation to establish all data pipeline connections before Instana backend services start, making it the single source of truth for backend datastore configuration. The correct answer is 'In the settings.hcl backend configuration file in separate datastore configuration blocks'. The incorrect options — 'In separate plugin configuration files under /opt/instana/agent/ for each datastore type', 'In the Kafka server.properties and ClickHouse config.xml files on their respective servers', 'In the Instana web UI under Administration > External Services after completing the first login' — are wrong because they do not align with IBM Instana's architecture or recommended practices for this scenario. Understanding this concept is essential for the Domain 2: Configuration domain of the IBM Instana Observability certification.