dbt-dummy

This is a dummy dbt (data build tool) project you can use to populate dbt seeds, models, snapshots and tests for testing purposes or experimentation.

The docker-compose.yml file consists of two services:

• postgres
• dbt

that are used to build the data models defined in the example project into a target Postgres database.

postgres service and the Sakila Database

This is an instance of a Postgres database initialised with Sakila database (and thus we are using the frantiseks/postgres-sakila image which is available on Docker Hub).

The database models a DVD rental store and contains several normalised tables that correspond to films, payments, customers and other entities.

Sakila Database was developed by Mike Hillyer, who used to be a member of the AB documentation team at MySQL. For more information regarding Sakila Database you can refer to the official MySQL documentation.

dbt service

This service is built out of the Dockerfile and is responsible for creating dbt seeds, models and snapshots on postgres service. The example dbt project contains seeds, models (staging, intermediate and mart) as well as snapshots.

Note that this is a dummy project, meaning that some entities (including aggregations) might not make too much sense from a business perspective. For example, even though the Sakila database contains the customer table already, we construct another table called customer_base that corresponds to a dbt seed, and is loaded form an external csv file.

Additionally, the models created may not be the perfect examples of what it should be considered as an intermediate or mart model. In general if you are interested in gaining a deeper understanding of these terms I would encourage you to read the following articles:

• Staging vs Intermediate vs Mart models in dbt
• How to structure your dbt project and data models

Feel free to add, modify or remove models while cloning or forking the project in order to serve the purpose you intend to use it for.

Running the dummy dbt project

First, let's build the services defined in our docker-compose.yml file:

docker-compose build

and now let's run the services so that the dbt models are created in our target Postgres database:

docker-compose up

This will spin up two containers namely dbt (out of the dbt-dummy image) and postgres (out of the frantiseks/postgres-sakila image).

Notes:

• For development purposes, both containers will remain up and running
• If you would like to end the dbt container, feel free to remove the && sleep infinity in CMD command of the Dockerfile

Building additional or modified data models

Once the containers are up and running, you can still make any modifications in the existing dbt project and re-run any command to serve the purpose of the modifications.

In order to build your data models, you first need to access the container.

To do so, we infer the container id for dbt running container:

docker ps

Then enter the running container:

docker exec -it <container-id> /bin/bash

And finally:

# Install dbt deps
dbt deps

# Build seeds
dbt seeds --profiles-dir profiles

# Build data models
dbt run --profiles-dir profiles

# Build snapshots
dbt snapshot --profiles-dir profiles

# Run tests
dbt test --profiles-dir profiles

Alternatively, you can run everything in just a single command:

dbt build --profiles-dir profiles

Querying seeds, models and snapshots on Postgres

In order to query and verify the seeds, models and snapshots created in the dummy dbt project, simply follow the steps below.

Find the container id of the postgres service (postgres):

docker ps 

Then run

docker exec -t <container-id> /bin/bash

We will then use psql, a terminal-based interface for PostgreSQL that allows us to query the database:

psql -U postgres

Now you can query the tables constructed form the seeds, models and snapshots defined in the dbt project:

-- Query seed tables
SELECT * FROM customer_base;

-- Query staging views
SELECT * FROM stg_payment;

-- Query intermediate views
SELECT * FROM int_customers_per_store;
SELECT * FROM int_revenue_by_date;

-- Query mart tables
SELECT * FROM cumulative_revenue;

-- Query snapshot tables
SELECT * FROM int_stock_balances_daily_grouped_by_day_snapshot;