SQL Window Functions: I guess that's why they call it window pain
· 5 min read
In this post, I will try to explain window (analytical) functions.
How the Snowflake Qualify Clause Changed My Life
· 3 min read
I know what you’re thinking: either this is a click-bait title or Alisa doesn’t have a lot going on in her life.
Data Engineering Project Idea for People Getting into Data Engineering
· 10 min read
It can be difficult to make a jump between job titles; doing an project can help.
How to Document a Data Pipeline
· 3 min read
This is my very first guest blog, contributed by Jared Rand.
Views in Snowflake
· 5 min read
Describing the different view types in Snowflake
Table Types in Snowflake
· 6 min read
This is my attempt to answer a Reddit question on table types
A Day in the Life of a Data Engineer
· 5 min read
The point of this post isn’t because I think I’m so awesome that you will all want to know my 1-step smoothie recipe and workout regimen
Things I Sometimes Do in Snowflake/SQL That You Should Not Do
· 5 min read
I have turned into a typical old school parent in that I find myself saying "Do what I say, not what I do."
Common Excel Functions in SQL
· 7 min read
My first job out of college was in insurance analytics. I learned a lot about insurance and a lot about Excel.
How many times does cat appear in the cat Wikipedia page?
· 8 min read
In this post, I’m going to hit the Wikipedia API to get data into a database because so often as data engineers our job is to hit an arbitrary API and extract, clean, and store the data.
How to practice data engineering when you're not data engineering
· 3 min read
One of the hard parts of data engineering is that, when you’re not at work, it is hard to practice because database management systems cost money, data infrastructure takes time to set up, and there are no stakeholders asking you interesting questions.
Uncool Things in Snowflake
· 5 min read
This is the third post in a series of Cool Things to do in Snowflake, but these are things that are really cool when you don’t do them; they’re Uncool Things to Do in Snowflake.
Advanced Cool Things in Snowflake
· 8 min read
This is part 2 to my blog post Cool Things in Snowflake as requested by one of my many fans.
A Good Day to Delete Hard
· 6 min read
Deletion method is an important data warehousing concept, one you’d ideally master before an interview.
Much Ado About NULL Things
· 6 min read
We have to talk about NULLs.
This post won’t include anything revolutionary, but rather just a summary of what NULLs are, what they aren't, and why they are important in data warehousing.
CTEs versus Subqueries
· 4 min read
I get this question a lot: Is a subquery more performant than a CTE?
Normal Forms for Normal People
· 12 min read
This post is for my friend Mitch, who, despite his persistent belief that he annoys me with his questions, has reminded me why it’s important that we stay hungry for theoretical knowledge even as we get caught up in our day-to-day work.
Functions in Where Clauses
· 4 min read
This post is part of a new series of mini-blogs I’m doing on SQL performance tuning tips.
How to Say It for Data Engineers
· 5 min read
I used to think people who made a big deal out of small syntactical or idiomatic differences were just being pedantic and condescending.
Cool Things in Snowflake
· 10 min read
The title of this post would be “10 Things I Like to Use in Snowflake That You Could Google but First You’d Have to Know They Exist.
Genius in Tech
· 4 min read
I just finished How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordan Ellenberg and one particular section made me think of tech.
ELI5 - Cross Products
· 4 min read
In order to understand cross products, you have to understand joins since cross products are a type of join.
ELI5 - Data Marts
· 6 min read
In this post, I will explain the concept of data marts with approachable language, but I won't be talking to my 5 year old nephew Rhys.
ELI5 - Primary Keys
· 4 min read
When I get requests to ingest or extract data as tables or reports, I often ask the requestor for the primary key.
ELI5 - Clustering
· 3 min read
This Explain Like I’m 5 will be about clustering, a technique used by Snowflake, a cloud based data warehouse, to improve query performance.
A Memory in Tech
· 5 min read
This is a real memory from when I was in first grade, so I was 6 to 7.
ELI5- Slowly Changing Dimensions
· 5 min read
Explain like I’m 5 (ELI5) comes from the popular concept that if you really know something well, you can explain it simply, so a five year old can understand.
Database Storage
· 4 min read
There are two types of relational database management systems: columnar and row-based, also called: column-wise and row-wise, column store and row store, column-based and row-based, and column-oriented and row-oriented.
Swearing in Tech
· 2 min read
Ideally, we shouldn’t swear at work. If we lived in an ideal world though, I may not have a blog.
Beer in Tech
· 5 min read
I’m wondering if beer in tech has reached its expiration date.
Names in Tech
· 3 min read
Let me start by saying that I love my name. I love the way it sounds.