My Snowflake Badge Story
My Snowflake data badge story essentially began in late 2019 when I (along with a few other senior resources) started training our teams to get them ready for an upcoming product for the company. One of the best parts in learning Snowflake is access to the tool itself. You have got nothing to install in your machine and the free tier accounts are, well, free. You can jump in immediately and any time you run out of credit; you can create another free tier account. Not to mention, the official training material is vast and they respond to tickets raised by even trial account.
The approach was simple — we do a couple of theory classes, talk about database on cloud, features that are unique to Snowflake (time-travel, cloning, data sharing etc.) and then jump on to the practice. The audience for those training had a background on databases, ETL and data warehouse so it was not much challenge. But we soon realised that Snowflake being easy was itself the biggest challenge.
There were few comments that came immediately -
1) This is pretty easy to learn. We don’t need dedicated classes. I already know SQL (and 20 other databases).
2) I understand everything, bring on the evaluation.
3) Where are the vouchers — I can clear certification yesterday itself.
Thankfully Snowflake University had launched first of the badges by then (albeit in a different format and name). Beginning with the trainers (including me) we attempted clearing the badge course and soon enough all realized clearing the seemingly so simple badges was not easy enough 😊. The learning was comprehensive and passing marks were whopping 90%. Suddenly, there was a challenge for all and there was a competition among those trained.
I have not stopped after the initial first badge. I have completed all Hands-On Badges and the SnowPro Core certification as well. Glad to say that I have done good personally in all of them, proud enough to write about them here.
Hands on Essentials — Data Warehouse
I completed this badge in January 2020 and it was my first badge from Snowflake university. This badge shows you have completed the coursework on database objects, virtual WH configuration and loading/querying of data to tables. This includes quizzes and project work. The project work is creation of video with you running the queries and showing results. Most of this course was pretty easy. For me the biggest challenge was the project work which meant I have to show my face and speak. And I happen to have a face fit for radio and a voice fit for newspaper. I have added my presentation below.
In my opinion this is a good way to evaluate the most fundamental concepts on Snowflake and this should be (again in my opinion) the bare minimum one should expect on any one working on Snowflake as a technical team member.
Hands on Essentials — Data Sharing
I completed this badge in August 2020 and, though the level is still foundational, here things start getting interesting. This badge course covers slightly advanced level topics such as data sharing, setting up yourself in data marketplace and data exchanges.
In my opinion these topics cover one of the easiest and quickest way to advertise your data (and hopefully monetise as well). The exercises in the related project works are pretty interesting and end with creating your own data exchange and related project report.
For me this project was a moment to be proud of — since my submission was one of the “exceptional” submissions and got featured as the template for anyone looking to make similar reports. I have added my project work below.
Hands on Essentials — Data Applications
This badge took more time for me than I actually planned. I completed this course in February 2021. To me it is an advanced level course (although it says foundational level) because it involves a number of concepts that are very niche.
The exercises in this course covered creation of IoT data pipeline on cloud and we have to create accounts on SoftwareAG Cumulocity (a wonderful tool I admit and so happy to learn while doing this course) and Google Cloud services (I am an AWS guy so for me this was new).
The badge course is longer than the previous badge courses and has certain section dedicated to developing Python and (optional) Java interfaces to Snowflake. As I mentioned I needed more time because I did two mistakes — 1) created Cumulocity account in a wrong region and 2) then didn’t take the screenshots of my setup output for my report. As a result, I had to do this course twice but I am not complaining since I can create entire setup without referring to instructions now.
Proud to say I scored 100% marks in my project work and happy to add it below.
There are two more badges expected in future as per my knowledge. I intend to do them both and hopefully get recognized as exceptional project work once again.
I also did complete my SnowPro Core Certification last year August . But my preparation about that is a separate story and I will write about it later.
