Skip to main content
Version: 0.16.16

How to Use Great Expectations in Databricks

Great Expectations works well with many types of Databricks workflows. This guide will help you run Great Expectations in Databricks.

Prerequisites​

  • Completed the Quickstart guide
  • Have completed Databricks setup including having a running Databricks cluster with attached notebook
  • If you are using the file based version of this guide, you'll need to have DBFS set up

We will cover a basic configuration to get you up and running quickly, and link to our other guides for more customized configurations. For example:

  • If you want to validate files stored in DBFS select one of the "File" tabs below.
    • If you are using a different file store (e.g. s3, GCS, ABS) take a look at our integration guides for those respective file stores.
  • If you already have a Spark DataFrame loaded, select one of the "DataFrame" tabs below.

1. Install Great Expectations​

Install Great Expectations as a notebook-scoped library by running the following command in your notebook:

  %pip install great-expectations
What is a notebook-scoped library?
A notebook-scoped library is what it sounds like - "custom Python environments that are specific to a notebook." You can also install a library at the cluster or workspace level. See the Databricks documentation on Libraries for more information.

After that we will take care of some imports that will be used later. Choose your configuration options to show applicable imports:

import great_expectations as gx
from great_expectations.checkpoint import SimpleCheckpoint

2. Set up Great Expectations​

In this guide, we will be using the Databricks File System (DBFS) for your Metadata Stores and Data DocsHuman readable documentation generated from Great Expectations metadata detailing Expectations, Validation Results, etc. store. This is a simple way to get up and running within the Databricks environment without configuring external resources. For other options for storing data see our "Metadata Stores" and "Data Docs" sections in the "How to Guides" for "Setting up Great Expectations."

What is DBFS?
Paraphrased from the Databricks docs: DBFS is a distributed file system mounted into a Databricks workspace and available on Databricks clusters. Files on DBFS can be written and read as if they were on a local filesystem, just by adding the /dbfs/ prefix to the path. It is also persisted to object storage, so you won’t lose data after you terminate a cluster. See the Databricks documentation for best practices including mounting object stores.

Run the following code to set up a Data ContextThe primary entry point for a Great Expectations deployment, with configurations and methods for all supporting components. in code using the appropriate defaults:

context_root_dir = "/dbfs/great_expectations/"
context = gx.get_context(context_root_dir=context_root_dir)

3. Prepare your data​

We will use our familiar NYC taxi yellow cab data, which is available as sample data in Databricks. Let's copy some example csv data to our DBFS folder for easier access using dbutils:

# Copy 3 months of data
for month in range(1, 4):
    dbutils.fs.cp(
      f"/databricks-datasets/nyctaxi/tripdata/yellow/yellow_tripdata_2019-0{month}.csv.gz",
      f"/example_data/nyctaxi/tripdata/yellow/yellow_tripdata_2019-0{month}.csv.gz"
    )

4. Connect to your data​

Add the Datasource:

base_directory = "/dbfs/example_data/nyctaxi/tripdata/yellow/"
dbfs_datasource = context.sources.add_or_update_spark_dbfs(
    name="version-0.16.16 my_spark_dbfs_datasource",
    base_directory=base_directory,
)

Add the Data Asset:

batching_regex = r"yellow_tripdata_(?P<year>\d{4})-(?P<month>\d{2})\.csv\.gz"
csv_asset = dbfs_datasource.add_csv_asset(
    name="version-0.16.16 yellow_tripdata",
    batching_regex=batching_regex,
    header=True,
    infer_schema=True,
)

Then we build a BatchRequest using the DataAsset we configured earlier to use as a sample of data when creating Expectations:

batch_request = csv_asset.build_batch_request()

🚀🚀 Congratulations! 🚀🚀 You successfully connected Great Expectations with your data.

Now let's keep going to create an Expectation Suite and validate our data.

5. Create Expectations​

Here we will use a ValidatorUsed to run an Expectation Suite against data. to interact with our batch of data and generate an Expectation SuiteA collection of verifiable assertions about data..

Each time we evaluate an Expectation (e.g. via validator.expect_*), it will immediately be Validated against your data. This instant feedback helps you zero in on unexpected data very quickly, taking a lot of the guesswork out of data exploration. Also, the Expectation configuration will be stored in the Validator. When you have run all of the Expectations you want for this dataset, you can call validator.save_expectation_suite() to save all of your Expectation configurations into an Expectation Suite for later use in a checkpoint.

First we create the suite and get a Validator:

expectation_suite_name = "version-0.16.16 insert_your_expectation_suite_name_here"
context.add_or_update_expectation_suite(expectation_suite_name=expectation_suite_name)
validator = context.get_validator(
    batch_request=batch_request,
    expectation_suite_name=expectation_suite_name,
)

print(validator.head())

Then we use the Validator to add a few Expectations:

validator.expect_table_column_count_to_equal(value=18)

Finally we save our Expectation Suite (all of the unique Expectation Configurations from each run of validator.expect_*) to our Expectation Store:

validator.save_expectation_suite(discard_failed_expectations=False)

6. Validate your data​

Here we will create and store a CheckpointThe primary means for validating data in a production deployment of Great Expectations. for our batch, which we can use to validate and run post-validation actions. Check out our docs on "Validating your data" for more info on how to customize your Checkpoints.

First, we create the Checkpoint configuration mirroring our batch_request configuration above and using the Expectation Suite we created:

my_checkpoint_name = "version-0.16.16 my_databricks_checkpoint"

checkpoint = SimpleCheckpoint(
    name=my_checkpoint_name,
    config_version=1.0,
    class_name="version-0.16.16 SimpleCheckpoint",
    run_name_template="%Y%m%d-%H%M%S-my-run-name-template",
    data_context=context,
)

Next, we add the Checkpoint:

context.add_or_update_checkpoint(checkpoint=checkpoint)

Finally, we run the Checkpoint:

checkpoint_result = context.run_checkpoint(
    checkpoint_name=my_checkpoint_name,
    validations=[
        {
            "batch_request": batch_request,
            "expectation_suite_name": expectation_suite_name,
        }
    ],
)

7. Build and view Data Docs​

Since we used a SimpleCheckpoint, our Checkpoint already contained an UpdateDataDocsAction which rendered our Data DocsHuman readable documentation generated from Great Expectations metadata detailing Expectations, Validation Results, etc. from the validation we just ran. That means our Data Docs store will contain a new rendered validation result.

How do I customize these actions?
Check out our docs on "Validating your data" for more info on how to customize your Checkpoints.

Also, to see the full Checkpoint configuration, you can run: print(my_checkpoint.get_substituted_config().to_yaml_str())

Since we used DBFS for our Data Docs store, we need to download our data docs locally to view them. If you use a different store, you can host your data docs in a place where they can be accessed directly by your team. To learn more, see our documentation on Data Docs for other locations e.g. filesystem, s3, GCS, ABS.

Run the following Databricks CLI command to download your data docs (replacing the paths as appropriate), then open the local copy of index.html to view your updated Data Docs:

databricks fs cp -r dbfs:/great_expectations/uncommitted/data_docs/local_site/ great_expectations/uncommitted/data_docs/local_site/

Using the displayHTML command is another option for displaying Data Docs in a Databricks notebook. There is a restriction, though, in that clicking on a link in the displayed data documents will result in an empty page. If you wish to see some validation results, use this approach.

html = '/dbfs/great_expectations/uncommitted/data_docs/local_site/index.html'
with open(html, "r") as f:
    data = "".join([l for l in f])
displayHTML(data)

8. Congratulations!​

You've successfully validated your data with Great Expectations using Databricks and viewed the resulting Data Docs. Check out our other guides for more customization options and happy validating!

View the full scripts used in this page on GitHub: