> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.streamnative.io/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Create Project

<Note title="Note">
  Please ensure you use version `2.6.0` or later of the `confluent-kafka` library.

  StreamNative Cloud does not support **librdkafka** versions `2.5.0` and `2.5.3`, or any client SDKs based on these versions (including confluent-kafka-python `2.5.0` and `2.5.3`). This is due to a backward compatibility regression in librdkafka that was fixed in version 2.6.0. For more information, see [librdkafka #4871](https://github.com/edenhill/librdkafka/issues/4871).

  For more details about version compatibility, see [StreamNative Cloud Kafka Compatibility](https://docs.streamnative.io/docs/kafka-compatibility).
</Note>

Create a new directory anywhere you’d like for this project:

```bash theme={null}
mkdir kafka-python-getting-started && cd kafka-python-getting-started
```

Create and activate a Python virtual environment to give yourself a clean, isolated environment for this project. You may use other virtual environment managers like `venv` if you prefer.

```bash theme={null}
virtualenv venv
source venv/bin/activate
```

Install the Apache Kafka Python client library:

```bash theme={null}
pip install confluent-kafka
```