Overview for database administrators

Database administrators control access to the source data used in Tonic Structural workspaces. They also ensure that Structural can write the transformed data to the destination database.

Database administrators might also be required to create Structural workspaces. The workspace configuration includes connection details for the source and destination databases.

Review the requirements for the data connector type

Before you set up Structural source and destination databases, review the requirements for the specific type of database. The data connector summary contains the list of supported data connectors, and includes links to the details for each connector.

For each data connector:

• The "System requirements" topic provides general requirements, including the supported versions of the database product.

• The "Before you create a workspace" topic provides information about required configuration such as database users and database permissions.

• The "Configuring workspace data connections" topic lists the data connection fields for workspaces.

Prepare a source database

In a Structural workspace, the source database provides the data for data generation.

For a source database, we recommend that you use a static copy of your production database that was restored from a backup.

If that's not possible, consider the following when you connect Structural to your source data:

• Structural cannot guarantee referential integrity of the output data if the source database is written to while data is generated. For this reason we recommend that you connect to a static copy of production data.

• Read replicas and fast followers can be problematic for Structural because of how long it takes some queries run. Read replicas tend to have short query timeout limits, which causes the queries to timeout. Read replicas also reflect recent writes, which means that we cannot guarantee the referential integrity of the output.

Make sure that the source database meets the system requirements. Also complete any required source database configuration in "Before you create a workspace".

For Structural Cloud, if your database only allows access from allowlisted IP addresses, then you must also allowlist the Structural Cloud IP addresses.

Prepare a destination database

For Structural data generation, the destination database is where Structural writes the transformed data.

By default, data generation is a destructive process. During data generation, Structural first drops the contents of the destination database, and then copies the schema from the source database.

Make sure that the destination database meets the system requirements. The destination database must use the same data connector and version as the source database.

Also complete any required destination database configuration in the "Before you create a workspace" topic for the data connector.

Connect a workspace to your data

A Structural workspace provides a context within which to configure and generate transformed data.

Every Structural workspace includes connection details for source and destination databases.

Database administrators might create Structural workspaces and configure the connection details. Alternatively, they might provide the connection details for other Structural users to use when they create a workspace.

When you configure the connection details for a workspace, follow the instructions in the "Workspace connection details" topic for the data connector.