Table of contents
1.
Introduction
2.
What is BigQuery?
3.
Features
3.1.
Tree Architecture
3.2.
Serverless Service
3.3.
SQL and Programming Language Support
3.4.
Security
3.5.
Pricing
4.
Using Google BigQuery
5.
Frequently Asked Questions
6.
Key Takeaways
Last Updated: Mar 27, 2024

Google BigQuery

Introduction

Organisations are acquiring data at an unprecedented rate nowadays. The volume of data is expanding dramatically, from sensor readings to customer behaviour, the need for big data and analytics solutions. For example, with Google Cloud databases, such tools are handy.

Good tools and solutions that allow us to store and analyse massive volumes of data quickly make a significant difference in our daily lives, allowing us to get the most out of our datasets and make data-driven decisions. In Google Cloud BigQuery, this feature is available.

What is BigQuery?

BigQuery is a Google Cloud Platform-based completely managed and serverless data warehouse solution that allows anyone to examine terabytes of data in seconds.

The Google BigQuery architecture is based on Dremel, a distributed system developed by Google to query massive datasets, but that's only the beginning of what BigQuery offers. When numerous users are searching data simultaneously, Dremel separates the query execution into slots to ensure fairness. Dremel uses Jupiter, Google's internal data centre network, to access the data storage, which is stored on the distributed file system nicknamed Colossus. Colossus is in charge of data replication, recovery, and distribution.

BigQuery uses a columnar style to store data, resulting in a high compression ratio and scanning throughout. BigQuery, on the other hand, maybe used with data from other Google Cloud services, including BigTable, Cloud Storage, Cloud SQL, and Google Drive.

BigQuery performs best when it has several petabytes of data to examine, thanks to its architecture designed for extensive data. Humans needing to perform interactive ad-hoc queries of read-only datasets are the use cases that BigQuery is most suited for. BigQuery is typically utilised at the end of the Big Data ETL pipeline, on top of processed data, or when complicated analytical queries to a relational database take several seconds to complete. BigQuery works effectively when the data does not frequently change because it has a built-in cache. Furthermore, scenarios with tiny datasets do not benefit from BigQuery, with a single query requiring up to a few seconds. As a result, it should not be utilised as a standard OLTP database. BigQuery was created with BIG data and analytics in mind.

It works as a fully managed service straight out of the box, so there's no need to install, set up, or maintain any infrastructure. Customers are only paid based on how many inquiries they submit and how much data they keep. On the other side, being a black box has its limitations since we have significantly less control of our data storage and handling.

BigQuery works with Google Cloud data and uses its storage services, which is a huge constraint and disadvantage. As a result, employing it as the primary data storage location is not advised since it restricts future design options. The raw dataset should then be saved someplace else, and a copy of it used in BigQuery for analytics.

Source: CXL

Learn more: Introduction to JQuery

Features

BigQuery was born from Dremel, which is Google's distributed query engine. Dremel can handle gigabytes of data in seconds. This includes running sophisticated queries on several servers in parallel to speed up processing.

Tree Architecture

Dremel and BigQuery can grow to thousands of computers by organising calculations as an execution tree. Incoming requests are routed via mixers, which modify them before distributing them to leaf nodes known as slots by a root server. The dirty job of reading and filtering input is done in parallel by the leaf nodes. The findings are sent back down the tree to the mixers, who blend them and send them to the root as the query's response.

Serverless Service

In most data warehouse setups, organisations must select and commit to the server hardware on which calculations will run. Administrators must consider performance, security, flexibility, and dependability. The use of a serverless paradigm overcomes this issue.

In a serverless method, the processing is automatically distributed among many devices working in parallel. When using BigQuery's serverless method, data engineers and database administrators may focus less on infrastructure and more on offering servers and creating insights from data.

SQL and Programming Language Support

BigQuery can be accessed using standard SQL, which is something that many people are already acquainted with. BigQuery also comes with client libraries for Java, Python, C#, Go, Node.js, PHP, and Ruby, which may be used to build data-accessing applications.

Security

When data in BigQuery is at rest or in transit, it is automatically encrypted. BigQuery also offers the capability of isolating jobs and managing multitenant security. Organisations may take a comprehensive perspective of data security since BigQuery is intimately linked with the security features of other GCP products.

Google Cloud Identity and Access Management allow users to share datasets (IAM). Individuals and groups can have access to datasets, tables, and views based on permissions specified by administrators.

The policy controls in Google's Virtual Private Cloud prevent anyone outside of our business from accessing data or attempting to export data to unauthorised third parties. IAM and VPC work together to close security gaps across Google Cloud Platform products.

Pricing

BigQuery price is determined by the amount of data stored and queries processed. There are two tiers of storage charges. Data that has been updated within the last 90 days are charged per month for active storage. Data that hasn't been modified in the last 90 days are charged at a lower monthly rate.

In addition, there are two price structures for enquiries. The amount of data handled by each query determines the on-demand cost. Customers pay a one-time fee for dedicated querying resources rather than per-query fees with flat-rate pricing. This pricing is intended for businesses that prefer a set price.

Using Google BigQuery

BigQuery is a Google Cloud Platform service. Customers of Google Cloud Platform can use their familiar web interface console to access the service. Google BigQuery APIs can also be accessed by current GCP SDKs and CLI tools, in addition to the UI Console.

Getting started with Google Cloud BigQuery is a straightforward procedure. Any dataset in a standard format, such as CSV, Parquet, ORC, Avro, or JSON, may be used immediately. If you don't have any data in mind for Google BigQuery, you can study and use datasets from Google Cloud Public Datasets.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Which language is used by BigQuery?
SQL(Structured Query Language) is used by BigQuery.
 

2. Is it possible to add data from Excel to BigQuery?
Yes, it is possible to add data from Excel to BigQuery in the form of a table.
 

3. What is the pricing structure of BigQuery?
BigQuery price is determined by the amount of data stored and queries processed.
 

4. Is the data in BigQuery stored in encrypted format?
Yes, all the data in BigQuery is stored in an encrypted format.

Key Takeaways

In this article, we have extensively discussed BigQuery. It is tremendously effective in providing data exploration and analysis capabilities from zero to hero with little effort, as you've just seen. Tools like BigQuery help extract value from data in a world where data is increasing at an unbelievable rate.

We hope that this blog has helped you enhance your knowledge regarding Google BigQuery and if you would like to learn more, check out our articles on Code studio. Do upvote our blog to help other ninjas grow. 

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