To use either of the streaming ingestion methods, you must first load the associated extension on both the Overlord and the Middle Manager. See [Loading extensions](../configuration/extensions.md#loading-extensions) for more information.
Streaming ingestion is controlled by a continuously running [supervisor](supervisor.md).
The supervisor oversees the state of indexing tasks to coordinate handoffs, manage failures, and ensure that scalability and replication requirements are maintained.
You start a supervisor by submitting a JSON specification, often referred to as the supervisor spec, either though the Druid web console or using the [Supervisor API](../api-reference/supervisor-api.md).