How to integrate Apache Airflow/OpenLineage

To integrate Apache Airflow/OpenLineage with Atlan, complete the following steps. To learn more about OpenLineage, refer to OpenLineage configuration and facets.

Atlan also supports other Apache Airflow distributions to enhance your data management and workflow capabilities:

• Amazon MWAA
• Astronomer
• Google Cloud Composer

Create an API token in Atlan

Before running the workflow, you will need to create an API token in Atlan.

Configure the integration in Atlan

Select the source

To select Apache Airflow/OpenLineage as your source, from within Atlan:

1. In the top right of any screen, click New and then click New workflow.
2. From the filters along the top, click Orchestrator.
3. From the list of packages, select Airflow Assets and then click Setup Workflow.

Create the connection

You will only need to create a connection once to enable Atlan to receive incoming OpenLineage events. Once you have set up the connection, you neither have to rerun the workflow nor schedule it. Atlan will process the OpenLineage events as and when your DAGs run to catalog your Apache Airflow assets.

To configure the Apache Airflow/OpenLineage connection, from within Atlan:

1. For Connection Name, provide a connection name that represents your source environment. For example, you might use values like production,development,gold, or analytics.
2. (Optional) To change the users who are able to manage this connection, change the users or groups listed under Connection Admins.
   🚨 Careful! If you do not specify any user or group, no one will be able to manage the connection — not even admins.
3. (Optional) For Host and Port, enter the URL and port number of your Apache Airflow UI, respectively. This will allow Atlan to help you view your assets directly in Apache Airflow from the asset profile.
4. For Enable OpenLineage Events, click Yes to enable the processing of OpenLineage events or click No to disable it. If disabled, new events will not be processed in Atlan.
5. To create a connection, at the bottom of the screen, click the Create connection button.

Configure the integration in Apache Airflow/OpenLineage

To configure Apache Airflow to send OpenLineage events to Atlan:

1. Based on your Apache Airflow version, there may be additional prerequisites for using OpenLineage:
   • For Apache Airflow versions 2.7.0 onward, download and install the latest apache-airflow-providers-openlineage package and update the requirements.txt file of your Apache Airflow instance with:

     apache-airflow-providers-openlineage

   • For Apache Airflow versions 2.5.0 onward, download and install the latest openlineage-airflow library and update the requirements.txt file of your Apache Airflow instance with:

     openlineage-airflow

2. Add the following environment variables to your project's .env file:
   • For Apache Airflow versions 2.7.0 onward:
     • AIRFLOW__OPENLINEAGE__NAMESPACE: set the connection name as exactly configured in Atlan.
     • AIRFLOW__OPENLINEAGE__TRANSPORT: specify details of where and how to send OpenLineage events in the following JSON string format:

       {
         "type": "http", 
         "url": "https://<instance>.atlan.com/events/openlineage/airflow/", 
         "auth": { 
           "type": "api_key", 
           "api_key": "<API_token>"
          }
       }

       • Replace <instance> with the name of your Atlan instance.
       • Replace <API_token> with the API token generated in Atlan.
   • For Apache Airflow versions 2.5.0 onward and prior to 2.7.0: 
     • OPENLINEAGE_URL: points to the service that will consume OpenLineage events — for example, https://<instance>.atlan.com/events/openlineage/airflow/.
     • OPENLINEAGE_API_KEY: set the API token generated in Atlan.
     • OPENLINEAGE_NAMESPACE: set the connection name as exactly configured in Atlan.

Verify the Atlan connection in Apache Airflow

To verify connectivity to Apache Airflow:

1. For Verify connection with Airflow, click the clipboard icon to copy and run the preflight check DAG on your Apache Airflow instance to test connectivity with Atlan. If you encounter any errors after running the DAG, refer to the preflight checks documentation.
2. Click Done to complete setup.

Once your DAGs have completed running in Apache Airflow, you will see Apache Airflow DAGs and tasks along with lineage from OpenLineage events in Atlan! 🎉

You can also view event logs in Atlan to track and debug events received from OpenLineage.