Overview

Alation Cloud Service Applies to Alation Cloud Service instances of Alation

Customer Managed Applies to customer-managed instances of Alation

Overview

The OCF connector for PostgreSQL was developed by Alation and is available as a Zip file that can be uploaded and installed in the Alation application. The connector is compiled together with the required database driver, so no additional effort is needed to procure and install the driver.

To download the PostgreSQL OCF connector package, go to the Alation Connector Hub available from the Customer Portal. Go to Customer Portal > Connectors > Alation Connector Hub. Only Alation users with access to the Customer Portal can access the Alation Connector Hub. If you don’t have access to the Customer Portal, contact Alation Support.

This connector should be used to catalog PostgreSQL as a data source on Alation on-prem and Alation Cloud Service instances. It extracts and catalogs such database objects as schemas, tables, columns, views, primary keys, foreign keys, indexes, functions, and function definition fields. After the metadata is extracted, it is represented in the data catalog as a hierarchy of catalog pages under the parent data source. Alation users can leverage the full catalog functionality to search for and find the extracted metadata, curate the corresponding catalog pages, create documentation about the data source, and exchange information about it.

Team

The following administrators are required to install this connector:

  • Alation administrator:

    • Ensures that Alation Connector Manager is installed and running or installs it.

    • Installs the connector

    • Creates and configures the PostgreSQL data source in the catalog

    • Performs initial extraction and prepares the data source for Alation users.

  • PostgreSQL administrator:

    • Creates a service account for Alation

    • Provides the JDBC URI to access metadata

    • Provides access to schemas to extract metadata.

Scope

The table below shows what features are covered by the connector. For version support information, refer to the support matrix for your specific release: Support Matrices.

Browser

PostgreSQL (EC2)

PostgreSQL (RDS)

PostgreSQL (Enterprise)

Core Capabilities

Automated Metadata Extraction (MDE)

Yes

Yes

Yes

Query-based MDE

Yes

Yes

Yes

Search

Yes

Yes

Yes

Catalog page curation

Yes

Yes

Yes

Catalog sets

Yes

Yes

Yes

Propagation of data quality flags

Yes

Yes

Yes

Popularity

Yes

Yes

Yes

Compose

On-prem Alation instances

Yes

Yes

Yes

Alation Cloud Service instances*

Yes

Yes

Yes

* Compose for data sources connected via Alation Agent is supported from connector version 1.0.4.2169.

QLI

Query-based

Yes

Yes

Yes

Filters

Yes

Yes

Yes

Lineage

Yes

Yes

Yes

Sampling and Profiling

Table sampling

Yes

Yes

Yes

Custom query-based table sampling

Yes

Yes

Yes

Custom query-based column profiling

Yes

Yes

Yes

Dynamic profiling

Yes

Yes

Yes

Authentication

Basic (username and password)

Yes

Yes

Yes

SSL

Yes

Yes

Yes

Kerberos

No

No

No

Keytab

No

No

No

LDAP

Yes

No

Yes

AWS Secrets Manager with Alation Agent

Yes

Yes

Yes

Technical Metadata

Tables

Yes

Yes

Yes

Attributes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Primary key

Yes

Yes

Yes

Foreign key

Yes

Yes

Yes

Views

Yes

Yes

Yes

Schemas

Yes

Yes

Yes

Source Comments

Yes*

Yes*

Yes*

* Source comments are extracted with some limitations. They are extracted for non-partitioned tables and columns but aren’t extracted for schemas and partition tables and their columns.