Data Platforms

• A data platform is where your data is stored, transformed, and made ready for analytics or machine learning.
• In data engineering, you’ll use platforms like Databricks, Snowflake, or BigQuery to run SQL queries, manage tables, orchestrate jobs, and store cleaned data for downstream use.

These platforms are the heart of modern data stacks - and knowing how to use them makes you instantly more valuable.

🧰 Tools for Platforms

Pick one platform to go deep on — you don’t need to learn all three at once.

• Databricks – Best for big data, Spark, and machine learning
• Snowflake – Clean SQL warehouse, super fast
• BigQuery – Google Cloud’s fully-managed, serverless warehouse

✅ Recommendation

Start with Databricks — it’s modern, in-demand, and offers a free Community Edition for hands-on practice.

If you're more into Google Cloud or serverless tools, BigQuery is also an excellent option.

🔥 Must-Learn Databricks Skills

• [ ] Notebooks & Clusters – Create notebooks and configure clusters to run your code.
• [ ] Databricks SQL - Run warehouse-style queries with native SQL support.
• [ ] Workflows - Build and Schedule Workflow jobs.
• [ ] Unity Catalog - Understand the terms of Unity Catalog and how to build Catalog.

📚 Resources - Databricks

• ▶️ Paid Course - Databricks By DataCamp → Link