Data Modeling with Snowflake: A practical guide to accelerating Snowflake development using universal data modeling techniques

Discover how Snowflake's unique objects and features can be used to leverage universal modeling techniques through real-world examples and SQL recipes

Purchase of the print or Kindle book includes a free PDF eBook
Key Features

Learn core modeling techniques tied to practical examples using native Snowflake architecture
Adopt a universal modeling language to communicate business value to functional teams
Go beyond physical modeling with SQL recipes to transform and shape your Snowflake data

Book Description

The Snowflake Data Cloud is one of the fastest-growing platforms for data warehousing and application workloads. Snowflake's scalable, cloud-native architecture and expansive set of features and objects enables you to deliver data solutions quicker than ever before.

Yet, we must ensure that these solutions are developed using recommended design patterns and accompanied by documentation that's easily accessible to everyone in the organization.

This book will help you get familiar with simple and practical data modeling frameworks that accelerate agile design and evolve with the project from concept to code. These universal principles have helped guide database design for decades, and this book pairs them with unique Snowflake-native objects and examples like never before – giving you a two-for-one crash course in theory as well as direct application.

By the end of this Snowflake book, you'll have learned how to leverage Snowflake's innovative features, such as time travel, zero-copy cloning, and change-data-capture, to create cost-effective, efficient designs through time-tested modeling principles that are easily digestible when coupled with real-world examples.
What you will learn

Discover the time-saving features and applications of data modeling
Explore Snowflake's cloud-native architecture and features
Understand and apply modeling concepts, techniques, and language using Snowflake objects
Master modeling concepts such as normalization and slowly changing dimensions
Get comfortable reading and transforming semi-structured data
Work directly with pre-built recipes and examples
Apply modeling frameworks from Star to Data Vault

Who this book is for

This book is for developers working with SQL who are looking to build a strong foundation in modeling best practices and gain an understanding of where they can be effectively applied to save time and effort. Whether you're an ace in SQL logic or starting out in database design, this book will equip you with the practical foundations of data modeling to guide you on your data journey with Snowflake. Developers who've recently discovered Snowflake will be able to uncover its core features and learn to incorporate them into universal modeling frameworks.
Table of Contents

Unlocking the Power of Modeling
An Introduction to the Four Modeling Types
Mastering Snowflake's Architecture
Mastering Snowflake Objects
Speaking Modeling through Snowflake Objects
Seeing Snowflake's Architecture through Modeling Notation
Putting Conceptual Modeling into Practice
Putting Logical Modeling into Practice
Database Normalization
Database Naming and Structure
Putting Physical Modeling into Practice
Putting Transformational Modeling into Practice
Modeling Slowly Changing Dimensions
Modeling Facts for Rapid Analysis
Modeling Semi-Structured Data
Modeling Hierarchies
Scaling Data Models through Modern Techniques
Appendix