Running data generation manually
Selecting the data generation option
To start the data generation, at the top right of the workspace management view, click Generate Data.
As you configure the data generation options, Structural runs checks to verify that you can use the current configuration to generate data.
If any of these checks do not pass, then when you click Generate Data, Structural displays information about why you cannot run the data generation job.
If all of those checks pass, then when you click Generate Data, if there are no warnings, the Confirm Generation panel displays.
Warning for notification schema changes
Data generation is always blocked by sensitive schema changes. Sensitive schema changes include new tables and columns that do not have an assigned generator.
The workspace configuration includes whether to block data generation for all schema changes, including notification changes. Notification schema changes include removed tables and columns.
If this setting is turned off, then if there are notification schema changes, when you click Generate Data, a warning displays.
To continue to the Confirm Generation panel, click Continue to Data Generation.
Warning for the Ephemeral Cloud database access configuration
When a workspace writes data to a snapshot on Ephemeral Cloud, the Confirm Generation panel can include a warning about database accessibility.
Data generation to Ephemeral includes the creation of a temporary database. By default, the temporary database is removed after the snapshot is created. You can also choose to preserve it.
By default, databases created in Ephemeral Cloud are publicly accessible. To restrict database access to specific IP addresses, an organization can choose to enable IP allowlisting. For more information, go to Configuring an allowlist for Ephemeral Cloud database connections in the Ephemeral documentation.
When databases are publicly accessible, the Confirm Generation panel always displays a warning. The warning is a reminder that databases are publicly accessible. To limit access, you must enable IP allowlisting in Ephemeral.
When IP allowlisting is enabled, a warning only displays when the temporary table is preserved. The warning in this case is a reminder to make sure that the IP allowlist includes your IP address, so that you can connect to the database.
Confirming the generation details
The Confirm Generation panel allows you to confirm the details for the data generation.
Indicating whether to use upsert
If upsert is available for the workspace, then you can also determine whether to use upsert for data generation.
If upsert is enabled for the workspace, then by default Use Upsert is in the on position.
To not use upsert, toggle Use Upsert to the off position. When upsert is turned off, the data generation is a simple data generation that directly populates and replaces the destination database.
Indicating whether to generate a subset
If you configured subsetting, then you can indicate whether to only generate the subset.
To create a subset based on the current subsetting configuration, toggle Use Subsetting to the on position.
The initial setting matches the current setting in the subsetting configuration. If Use subsetting is enabled in Subsetting view, then it is enabled by default on the Generation Confirmation panel.
When you change the setting on the generation confirmation panel, it also updates the setting on Subsetting view.
Determining the data generation process to use (Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL only)
Tonic.ai has released an improved version of the data generation process. It is used automatically for several data connectors. It is optional for Oracle, SQL Server, and MySQL.
For the new process, the job type is Data Pipeline Generation instead of Data Generation.
By default, Oracle and SQL Server workspaces use the new process, and MySQL workspaces use the previous process.
On the Confirm Generation panel, the Data Pipeline V2 toggle indicates whether to use the new process:
When the toggle is in the off position, Structural uses the previous process.
When the toggle is in the on position, Structural uses the new process.
Enabling diagnostic logging for the job
By default, Structural redacts sensitive values from the logs. To help support troubleshooting, you can configure some Structural data connectors to use diagnostic logging, which generates unredacted versions of the log files. For details, go to Enabling diagnostic logs across a Structural instance for specific data connectors.
If the data connector is not configured to use diagnostic logging, then you can choose whether to enable diagnostic logging for an individual data generation job. The option is also available for data connectors that do not have a diagnostic logging setting.
On the Confirm Generation panel, to enable diagnostic logging for the job, toggle Enable Diagnostic Logging to the on position.
Access to diagnostic logs is also controlled by the Enable diagnostic logging global permission. If you do not have this permission, then you cannot download diagnostic logs.
Indicating whether to generate performance metrics
To help to troubleshoot issues, for workspaces that use the newer data generation processing, you can configure the data generation job to also generate performance metrics.
The performance metrics start when a specified table is processed, and continue for a specified length of time.
To enable performance metrics for the data generation job:
Toggle Collect Performance Metrics to the on position.
From the Table Trigger dropdown list, select the table that triggers the performance metrics.
From the Trace Duration dropdown list, select the length of time to run the performance metrics.
Viewing the destination location
The Confirm Generation panel provides the destination information for the workspace. To display the destination database connection details, click Destination Settings.
Depending on the workspace configuration and data connector type, the destination information is either:
Connection information for a database server.
A storage location such as an S3 bucket.
Configuration for an Ephemeral snapshot.
Information to create container artifacts.
If the destination information is incorrect, to navigate to the workspace configuration view to make updates, click Edit Destination Settings.
For a file connector workspace, if the source files came from a local file system, then the destination files are written to the large file store in the Structural application database. You can download the most recently generated files.
If the destination data is written to a container repository, then from the Confirm Generation panel, you can configure custom tag values to use for the artifacts that the data generation job generates. For information about how to configure the tag values, go to Providing tags for the container artifacts.
Verifying the intermediate database connection information (for upsert)
When upsert is enabled, the Confirm Generation panel provides access to the connection information for the intermediate database. To display the intermediate database connection details, click Intermediate Upsert Database.
If the intermediate database information is incorrect, to navigate to the workspace configuration view to make updates, click Edit Intermediate.
Viewing generation performance tips
For data generation, assigning Truncate table mode to tables that you don't need data for can improve generation performance.
For subsetting, if an upstream table is very large, and the foreign key columns are not indexed, then it can make the subsetting process run more slowly.
The Want faster generations? message displays at the bottom of the Confirm Generation panel. It displays for all non-subsetting jobs. For subsetting jobs, the panel only displays if Structural identified columns that you should consider indexing.
To display information about tips for faster generation, click Generation Tips.
Viewing suggested columns to index
On the Generation Tips panel for subsetting jobs, the Add Indexes panel displays the first few columns that you might consider indexing.
To display a panel with a suggested SQL command to add the index, click the information icon next to the column.
On the panel, to copy the command to the clipboard, click Copy SQL to Clipboard.
If there are additional columns that are not listed, then to display the full list of columns to index, click Show all columns.
On the full list, to download the list to a CSV file, click Download list of columns (.csv).
Hint to truncate tables
On the Generation Tips panel for non-subsetting jobs, the Truncate Tables panel displays the hint to truncate tables that contain data that you do not need in the destination database.
To navigate to Database View to change the current configuration, click Go to Database View.
Starting the generation job
On the Confirm Generation panel, after you confirm the generation details, to start the data generation, click Run Generation.
When upsert is enabled, to start the data generation and upsert jobs:
Click Run Generation + Upsert.
In the menu, click Run Generation + Upsert.
Structural displays a notification that the job has started. To track the progress of the data generation job and view the results, click the View Job button on the notification, or go to Jobs view.
Starting an upsert job based on the most recent data generation
If upsert is enabled for a workspace, then on the Confirm Generation panel, the more common option is to run both data generation and upsert.
After you run at least one successful data generation to the intermediate database, then you can also choose to run only the upsert process.
For example, if the data generation succeeds but the upsert process fails, then after you address the issues that caused the upsert to fail, you can run the upsert process again.
You also must start the upsert job manually if you turn off Automatically Start Upsert After Successful Data Generation in the workspace settings.
From the Confirm Generation panel, to run upsert only:
Click the Run Generation + Upsert button.
In the menu, click Run Upsert Only.
When you run upsert only, the process uses the results of the most recent data generation.
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