CLI install & configure
We recommend you install Elementary CLI using one of the following methods:
Install Elementary CLI
To install the monitor module run:
Run one of the following commands based on your platform (no need to run all):
Run edr --help
in order to ensure the installation was successful.
If you're receiving command not found: edr
please check our troubleshooting guide.
Install from source
Install Elementary directly from GitHub source:
Validate installation
To validate the installation and get usage instructions for the CLI run:
CLI configuration
Elementary CLI requires a connection profile to connect to DWH. Additional configuration is made on config.yml
:
- Required:
HOME_DIR/.dbt/profiles.yml
- Connection details to the data warehouse, in the format of dbt connection profile namedelementary
. - Optional:
HOME_DIR/.edr/config.yml
- Elementary configuration.
(These default paths and names may be changed using the CLI options).
How to create 'profiles.yml'?
How to create 'profiles.yml'?
Configuring the Elementary Profile
In order to connect, Elementary needs a connection profile in a file named profiles.yml
.
This profile will be used by the CLI, to connect to the DWH and find the dbt package tables.
The easiest way to generate the profile is to run the following command within the dbt project where you deployed the elementary dbt package (works in dbt cloud as well):
Ensure that you fill in your password and any other missing fields after you
paste the profile in your local profiles.yml
file.
Copy the output, fill in the missing fields and add the profile to your profiles.yml
.
Here is a demonstration:
Elementary profile details and format
- Path:
HOME_DIR/.dbt/profiles.yml
- Profile name:
elementary
- Schema name: The schema of elementary models, default is
<your_dbt_project_schema>_elementary
dbt-core user? You already have profiles.yml
dbt-core user? You already have profiles.yml
If you are a dbt user, you already have a profiles.yml
file that you can use. The default path of the dbt profiles file is ~/.dbt/
directory.
- For further details, please refer to dbt’s documentation about the file.
- Note: in BigQuery we require ‘location’ (details), and in dbt it is optional.
What is a connection profile?
What is a connection profile?
Elementary requires connection details and credentials to connect to the data warehouse.
These are configured in a connection profile using a file named profiles.yml
.
We recommend creating a dedicated database, or at least a schema.
Elementary leverages dbt's connection profile format.
dbt-core users
Just add a profile with the relevant details, and name it elementary
.
What permissions are required for the elementary profile?
What permissions are required for the elementary profile?
The provided credentials need to have permission to:
- Read - Information schema and the tables configured for monitoring.,
- Write - To the database configured in
elementary
profile, including creating new schemas.
How to create 'config.yml'?
How to create 'config.yml'?
Only create this file if you need to use it for configuration, it is not mandatory.
Create a new directory and yml file under: HOME_DIR/.edr/config.yml
Here is the format of the yml itself:
Anonymous tracking
Anonymous tracking
We want to keep building and improving, and for that, we need to understand how users work with Elementary (and data is fun!). For that we added an anonymous tracking of events using Posthog (open-source product analytics, highly recommended).
We only track start, end, platform, number of queries and the size of the graph. No credentials, queries content, table names or anything private (not now and not ever).
By default this completely anonymous tracking is turned on. You can opt-out at any time by adding the following to your config.yml
file:
Have a question?
Have a question?
We are available on Slack, reach out for any kind of help!