Insights tips and tricks

At Atlan, we are committed to powering your user experience. Here are a few tips and tricks to help you get the most out of Insights for you and your team!

Export large query results via email

Previously, users could only scan and see query results for up to 100,000 rows by default. To help you scan more rows and export those results, you can now export queries for more than 100,000 rows directly to your email inbox.

To export query results for more than 100,000 rows to your email inbox:

1. In the query editor in Insights, type a limit for more than 100,000.
   (Note: Be sure to uncheck the Limit to 100 rows box in the query editor.)
2. Click Run to run the query.
3. The query results set will only display 100,000 rows. In the yellow bar above the query results set, click Send results via email.
4. You will need to save the query to get the results via email. In the Save Query dialog box:
   1. Select the relevant Query collection to save your query. If you haven't created one, you will get a prompt to create a query collection during this step. 
   2. For Query name, type a name for your query.
   3. (Optional) Add a description, certification status, and term. 
   4. Click Save Query to receive the query results in your email inbox.
5. (Optional) To add an announcement to alert others in your team, click Add Announcement. 

The query results will be delivered to your email inbox in a CSV file! 🎉

If your saved query consists of multiple queries, you'll receive the results for each query in a separate CSV file.

Open asset sidebar from Insights

To get all the context you need before querying an asset, you can open the asset sidebar directly from Insights.

To open the asset sidebar:

• In the Explorer left panel in Insights, hover over a table and click on the Open sidebar icon. (The name may vary depending on the asset type, such as Open table sidebar for table assets).

You will now be able to view the asset sidebar for the asset you'd like to query! 🎉

Search and sort query results

Search query results

With the search feature enabled for query results, you can use the search bar to type a search term and filter your results by that specific term. 

To search your query results after running a query:

1. In the query results set in Insights, click the Search results bar.
2. In the Search results bar, type your search term, such as Tuesday, to see the query results for that term.

Sort query results

If you'd like to sort your query results, use the sort feature to order your query results. 

To sort your query results after running a query:

• In the query results set in Insights, click on a column name, such as user id, to sort your results in an ascending or descending order.

Add inferred data types

If your column data is stored in a standard data type — for example, STRING — you can add an inferred data type to the column. This will help you query the data using the Visual Query Builder. 

For example, if your column contains dates stored in a STRING format, you can infer this column as a DATE data type in Atlan.

To add an inferred data type:

From a query

1. From the left menu of any screen, click Insights.
2. At the top of the screen, to the right of the Untitled tab, click the + button and select New visual query.
3. Under Select from, choose the table you want to query.
4. In the column selector to the right, select the column to which you want to add an inferred data type — for this example, we'll choose a column with a STRING data type, stringDateColumn.
5. Hover over your selected column, and in the top right of the metadata popover, click the Open sidebar icon.
6. At the top of the column sidebar, click the three dots icon and then click Add inferred datatype.
7. For Add Inferred datatype, type a secondary data type — for this example, we'll add a DATE data type.
8. Click Add to add your inferred data type. 
9. (Optional) To query the column with an inferred data type:
   1. In the query editor, click the blue circular + button and then select Filter as the action.
   2. For WHERE, select the column with an inferred data type.
   3. Under the selected column, click the inferred data type option to query the column in Atlan.

From an asset

1. From the left menu of any screen, click Assets.
2. On the Assets page, click a column asset with a STRING data type to open the asset sidebar — for example, stringDateColumn.
3. At the top of the column sidebar, click the three dots icon and then click Add inferred datatype.
4. For Add Inferred datatype, type a secondary data type — for this example, we'll add a DATE data type.
5. Click Add to add your inferred data type.

The inferred data type for your selected column will now be displayed in the asset sidebar! 🎉

To remove the inferred data type from a column asset, click the pencil icon. In the dialog, click x to remove the data type and then click Remove to confirm removal. 

View querying costs

To help you gain the most value-driven insights in Atlan, you will receive a cost nudge before querying your Google BigQuery views and materialized views. This will inform you about the precise bytes that will be spent during the execution of the query, helping you decide if you would still like to run the query. For all subsequent runs of the same query, Atlan will use cached query results from Google BigQuery — note that the query text must be the same as the original query.

Google BigQuery table assets are already cost-optimized for querying.

To view querying costs for a Google BigQuery view:

1. Under the Explorer tab in Insights, hover over a Google BigQuery view and click the play icon.
2. In the cost preview dialog, click Cancel to cancel running the query based on the costs shown or click Run to proceed with running the query.