Cost-efficient working with Snowflake: more control, lower costs
Snowflake has embraced the cloud model as much as possible and offers organizations the opportunity to work cost-efficiently. With Snowflake, you pay based on actual use, which gives you more control over the amount of workloads you deploy, for how long and at what cost.
More control with workload management
A practical example: suppose you have a huge database with millions of records in which you want to analyze data. In order to arrive at the right queries and algorithms, you can choose to have your data analyst work with a smaller limited set first. Only if successful can these queries and algorithms be applied to the entire dataset to see if they still produce the right result.
Within Snowflake, this process is very fast and easy to arrange. But it is also important to scale up in time. Suppose you want to apply the developed queries and algorithms to a gigantic dataset, then it is wise to significantly increase the deployed workloads.
Faster results, lower costs
In the demonstration we were given, scaling up made a huge difference and also saved costs. Running a heavy query on a large database with a limited workload can take tens of minutes or even hours. However, the same query executed on much heavier hardware can be completed in under a minute. The cost of the heavier workload may only be three times higher per hour compared to the smaller workload. Choosing the right workload for the right query is therefore essential to save costs.
When Snowflake is deployed in a production environment where the database is used 24/7, it is important that the chosen workload can withstand the many requests. Fortunately, Snowflake also offers the possibility to scale up and down, so that performance always remains optimal.
Share data and collaborate with Snowflake
Good data analysts are scarce, which is why many companies regularly hire external analysts to help them analyze crucial company data. Within Snowflake, it is possible to also give external users access to the data, whereby you can configure the user rights precisely. This way, you can determine which data a user can access down to row level. This means that an external analyst can work with a more limited data set, whereby very crucial data is shielded. At the same time, an internal employee can apply his analyses to the entire data set. In this way, in some cases, certain compliance requirements can be better met.
Use Snowflake Data Exchange
Finally, it is good to know that Snowflake facilitates in a Data Exchange. Here, users can share valuable datasets with other Snowflake users. This can be done for free or for a fee. For example, there are databases available with information about IP addresses or weather forecasts per city worldwide. For application developers, the Snowflake Data Exchange can be a very valuable resource, because it makes data accessible faster and can accelerate the development of applications.
With Snowflake, you not only deploy a powerful cloud platform for data analysis, but you also benefit from cost-efficient working, more control over workloads and collaboration with external analysts. In addition, Snowflake offers the possibility to share valuable datasets via the Data Exchange. Make full use of the possibilities of Snowflake and prepare your organization for success in the data-driven era.
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