When I was preparing for the Salesforce Data Cloud certification, I came across the term Zero-ETL. Data Cloud offers the ability to access data directly from other systems, such as data warehouses or data lakes, or share data with these systems without the data being copied. Salesforce also describes this as Bring Your Own Lake (BYOL), referring to the term Bring Your Own Device (BYOD). I wanted to better understand the concept of Zero-ETL and illustrate it in an understandable way.
In this article, I will show you how you can create a simplified ETL process with Python to better understand this concept, what Zero-ETL or Zero-Copy means, and how this new approach to data integration is implemented in Salesforce Data Cloud.
table of Contents
1) Traditional ETL Process: Step-by-Step Guide with Python for Beginners
2) So what is Zero-ETL?
3) Why Zero-ETL? Advantages and disadvantages
4) What does Zero-ETL look like in Salesforce Data Cloud?
5) Final thoughts
If you are already familiar with ETL and ELT processes, you can skip this section. If you are new to this topic, take a look at the super simplified example to better understand the Extract – Transform – Load process. Or better yet, build it yourself; By applying it, you will usually understand the concepts better.
