Astera DW Builder 9.0 – Release Notes¶
Astera Data Warehouse Builder 9.0 is the newest addition to Astera’s comprehensive list of data solutions. The product features a brand-new data warehouse automation platform that offers an agile, meta-data driven approach to building on-prem and cloud data warehouses. Moreover, it also comes with the high-performance ETL and ELT engines that users of Astera Centerprise are already familiar with.
Here’s a round-up of what’s new in this product and what you can expect in upcoming releases.
What’s New?¶
Data Models¶
You can create data models from scratch via the toolbox entities and user-friendly drag-and-drop interface. Alternatively, you can use the data model context menu to add new entities to a model. The data model toolbar gives you the option to create identifying, non-identifying, and self-reference relationships between and within these entities.
Reverse Engineer¶
We also provide users with the ability to construct a data model from an existing database by using the Reverse Engineer option. This option will enable you to point to an existing database and create a logical structure that incorporates the tables in this database and the relationships between them. All that with just a few simple clicks!
Dimensional Modeling¶
Astera DW Builder’s dimensional modeling functionality allows you to convert a data model to a dimensional model by conveniently assigning fact and dimension types.
Dimension¶
Once you’ve assigned the dimension type to an entity, you can also allot specified Dimension Roles to the fields present in the entity. The following roles are available:
- Surrogate Key
- Business Key
- SCD1, SCD2, SCD3, and SCD6 – We now support multiples sets of SCD3 and SCD6 values.
- Row Identifiers – Effective Date, Expiration Date, Current Record Designator, and Version Number.
- Placeholder Dimension
Fact¶
Once you’ve assigned the fact type to an entity, you can allot the Transaction Date Key role to a field in the fact entity layout.
Date & Time Dimension¶
The Date Dimension and Time Dimension objects in the data model toolbox can be added to a dimensional model to aid in analyzing and reporting data more efficiently.
Generate DDL Script¶
You can use the Generate DDL Script option available under the Forward Engineer functionality to transform a logical data model into a physical model by generating the database schema.
Indexes¶
For every data model entity, you can create indexes to increase the speed of data retrieval based on a field or a set of fields.
Data Model Deployment & OData¶
Users may also deploy or publish a model to the server for consumption. The product’s built-in OData module makes deployed models available to be used in ETL pipelines via dataflows or for data analytics and visualization in industry-leading tools like Power BI, Tableau, Domo, etc.
In a dataflow, you can access a deployed model through multiple objects via the newly added Astera Data Model data provider.
Verification¶
The Verification option allows you to check a data model for any possible errors or warnings. There are two sub-options available within the Verification option:
- Verify for Read and Write Deployment: To check if the model is ready to be deployed on the server.
- Verify for Forward Engineering: To check if any changes made to a model are ready to be mirrored to a target database.
Validate Metadata and Data Integrity¶
Using this option, you can check the integrity of the metadata and data present within the entities in a deployed dimensional model. This allows you to ensure that the data present in dimensions is correct and valid. You can access this option from within the Data Source Browser when you connect it to an Astera Data Model (ADM).
Dataflow Objects¶
We’ve added three new objects to the already extensive variety of accessories available in the dataflow toolbox. In the Sources section, we’ve added the Data Model Query object. Moreover, we’ve included a new section titled Data Warehouse in the dataflow toolbox. This new section contains two objects, Fact Loader and Dimension Loader.
Data Model Query¶
The Data Model Query object allows you to extract multiple tables from a deployed data model. The contents of these tables are organized in a hierarchical structure and can be mapped to any further objects in the dataflow. This is particularly useful when a destination contains fields from multiple tables in a source model.
Note: The Data Model Query object was available as the Multi-table Query Source object in previous versions of Astera Centerprise.
Fact Loader¶
The Fact Loader object can be used to load data into a fact table by mapping the relevant fields from a source object.
Dimension Loader¶
The Dimension Loader object, previously available as SCD in the dataflow toolbox, can be used to load data into a dimension table by mapping the relevant fields from a source object.
What’s Coming?¶
Data Providers¶
At the moment, we support four data providers in Astera DW Builder:
- SQL
- PostgreSQL
- Snowflake
More providers will be added to this list in upcoming releases.
Forward Engineer¶
The Forward Engineer functionality is currently restricted to the Generate DDL Script option. However, in future releases, the option will allow you to directly mirror any changes made to a data model into a target database.
Indexes¶
Astera DW Builder currently supports a generalized indexing protocol. However, in future releases, you will be able to create and edit data provider specific indexes.
Known Issues¶
- There are a couple of transient errors that may appear during data model deployment. These will go away when you save the data model once. They are indicated by the following error messages:
- Please login to perform this action.
- There is already an open DataReader associated with this Command which must be closed first…
- When reverse engineering from an Oracle database, you may experience an inconsistency in the number of relationships that appear between two entities.
Looking to try out our newest release? Click here to download a trial version for Astera DW Builder 9.0. If you have any questions, feedback, or suggestions, feel free to reach out to us at support@astera.com.