Quick start: Virtualize data

To preview this task, watch the video beginning at 00:10.

You need a project to store the virtualized data. Follow these steps to open an existing project or create a new project.

1. From the Navigation Menu , choose Projects > View all projects

2. If you have an existing project, open it.

3. If you don't have an existing project, then click New project.

4. Select Create an empty project.

5. Enter a name and optional description for the project.

6. Choose an existing object storage service instance or create a new one.

7. Click Create.

For more information or to watch a video, see Creating a project.

To preview this task, watch the video beginning at 00:32.

This tutorial requires the Watson Query service, and optional services Watson Studio and IBM Knowledge Catalog. Follow these steps to create these services:

1. From the Navigation Menu , click Services > Service instances.

2. If you have a Watson Query service listed, then there is no need to provision another instance. Otherwise, follow these steps:

   1. Click Add service.

   2. Select Watson Query.

   3. Select the Lite plan for Watson Query.

   4. Click Create.

3. Verify that the services are provisioned on your Service instances page.

For more information, see Watson Query on Cloud Pak for Data as a Service.

To preview this task, watch the video beginning at 00:58.

Before you can virtualize the data, you need create a connection to the data source. Follow these steps to create a connection in Data Virtualization:

1. From the Navigation Menu , select Data > Data virtualization. The list of configured Data sources displays.

2. Click Add connection > New connection.

3. Select Db2 Warehouse on Cloud, and click Select.

4. Complete the connection details using the following information:

   • Name: Db2 Warehouse
   • Database: BLUDB
   • Hostname or IP address: db2w-ruggyab.us-south.db2w.cloud.ibm.com
   • Port: 50001
   • Username: CPDEMO
   • Password: DataFabric@2022IBM
   • Select the Port is SSL-enabled checkbox.

5. Click Test.

6. Click Create.

For more information, see Adding and connecting to data sources in Watson Query.

To preview this task, watch the video beginning at 01:45.

With the connection defined, you can virtualize data from that data source. Follow these steps to add the tables to your virtualized data.

1. From the Data Virtualization menu, select Virtualization > Virtualize, and wait for the available tables to load.

2. Locate and select the customers and sales tables from the list, and click Add to cart.

3. Click View cart.

4. Clear the Assign to project field. This will add the two tables to your list of virtualized data, but not add them to a project. Later, you will add virtualized data to your project.

5. Click Virtualize.

6. Click Confirm.

7. Click Go to virtualized data.

For more information, see Creating virtual objects in Watson Query.

To preview this task, watch the video beginning at 02:43.

Next, follow these steps to join two tables to create a virtualized asset and publish that to a catalog and project:

1. On the Virtualized data screen, select the customers and sales tables from the list, and click Join.

2. For each table, search for salesrep.

3. Connect the SALESREP_ID columns in the two tables.

4. Click Next.

5. Review the joined table, and click Next.

6. For the view name, type joined_customers_sales_table.

7. Select a project from the list.

8. Check the Publish to catalog option, and select a catalog.

9. Click Create view.

10. When the process completes, you can either view the project or the catalog to preview the virtualized data. You will need an IBM Cloud API key to view the data in the project or catalog. See Creating an IBM Cloud API key.

For more information, see Governing virtual data in Watson Query.