Sample Connections

Importing metadata into the Agnostic Data Labs app format can be done through the app and it’s metadata importer feature.

Connections JSON Example

The importer must be provided with JSON to import the data. This JSON can be created using any preferred method. This JSON must be derived outside of the app itself, using a SQL script, Powershell script, utility app, or similar.

The importer format is a lightweight version of the full metadata schema, and allows for matching the imported metadata to the existing metadata by names and conventions instead of identifiers.

If the metadata you gather has all the required information, consider adding the generated metadata as json files straight to the repository instead of running it through the importer.

The main simplification done in the removal of id attributes and the use of name matching instead.

The main added feature is the ability to define the target file name as part of the imported metadata. The formal metadata schema doesn’t include the folder/file names in the metadata itself, so defining it on import makes it easier to organize the metadata both in the model as well as on disk. The format is also a list of Connections or Data Objects, allowing an arbitrary list of either metadata type to be imported.

The following JSON illustrates how the format for a list of Connections might look.

[
    {
        "name": "AdventureWorksLT2012",
        "folder": "\/sources",
        "fileName": "AdventureWorksLT2012.json",
        "extensions": [
            {
                "key": "connectionType",
                "value": "MSSQLDB"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultDatastore",
                "value": "AdventureWorksLT2012"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultLocation",
                "value": "dbo"
            }
        ]
    },
    {
        "name": "Northwind",
        "folder": "\/sources",
        "fileName": "Northwind.json",
        "extensions": [
            {
                "key": "connectionType",
                "value": "MSSQLDB"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultDatastore",
                "value": "Northwind"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultLocation",
                "value": "dbo"
            }
        ]
    },
    {
        "name": "WideWorldImporters",
        "folder": "\/sources",
        "fileName": "WideWorldImporters.json",
        "extensions": [
            {
                "key": "connectionType",
                "value": "MSSQLDB"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultDatastore",
                "value": "WideWorldImporters"
            },
            {
                "key": "defaultLocation",
                "value": "dbo"
            }
        ]
    }
]