Query the Data Delivery Network
Query the DDNThe easiest way to query any data on Splitgraph is via the "Data Delivery Network" (DDN). The DDN is a single endpoint that speaks the PostgreSQL wire protocol. Any Splitgraph user can connect to it at data.splitgraph.com:5432 and query any version of over 40,000 datasets that are hosted or proxied by Splitgraph.
For example, you can query the candidate_surplus_funds_reports table in this repository, by referencing it like:
"wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latest"."candidate_surplus_funds_reports"or in a full query, like:
SELECT
":id", -- Socrata column ID
"thru_date", -- A C4 report covers a specific period of time. This column is the end date of the report.
"filer_name", -- The registered name of the surplus funds account.
"committee_id", -- Committee ID
"version", -- The version of the report, representing the structure and elements of the submission. The version is necessary because the data structure is subject to change and improvement over time. Mostly relevant to data that is provided as JSON columns. Two reports records with different versions may not be interpreted in the same way due to changes in the organization of the data that may occur between versions. Any analysis should account for version changes.
"report_number", -- The unique number assigned to a report when it is filed. A 10 character number represents a paper filed report whose data was manually entered into the database. A 9 character number represents an electronically filed report.
"url", -- A link to a PDF version of the C4 summary report as it was filed with the PDC.
"spent", -- This column is the cumulative total that has been spent out of the account from inception.
"raised", -- This column is the cumulative total that has been transferred into the account from inception.
"person_id", -- The unique ID assigned to a public office holder or candidate. This id is consistent across years and, offices or candidacies and is the preferred id for identifying a natural person.
"amends_report", -- This field only applies to records which amend a prior report. The value is the report number of the previous version of the report that is superseded by this record.
"origin", -- This column designates what type of report the data was retrieved from.
"amended_by_report", -- This field only applies to records which have been superseded by an amendment. The value is the report number of the newer version of the report.
"id", -- PDC internal identifier that corresponds to a candidate's surplus funds account. A candidate has only one surplus account which is valid until terminated. There is not an election year associated with a surplus funds account, money is transferred in and spent out of the account until closed.
"metadata", -- At the point is submitted, the PDC automatically calculates totals and subtotals for certain information to make the report information easier to understand. This is primarily information that used to be captured on the forms, prior to electronic filing where the values can be calculated. None of the information in this field is supplied by the filer. The information is semi-structured JSON so that it is machine readable. The schema version of the information mirrors the schema version of the report_data column.
"attachments", -- The report's attachment urls and all associated metadata in json format. Attachments may include original scanned reports (in the event of electronic filing exmeptions) or additional documentation supplied by the filer. Attachments may not be present on a given report.
"filer_id", -- The unique id assigned to a candidate's surplus account. The filer id remains the same throughout years.
"year", -- This column is provided to clarify in what year a report is filed. Since a surplus funds account can be active for multiple years, this column is created using the thru_date.
"from_date", -- A C4 report covers a specific period of time. This column is the start date of the report.
"balance" -- This column shows the balance of surplus funds that a candidate reported on the last C4. This balance remains in the account until disposed of per RCW 42.17.
FROM
"wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latest"."candidate_surplus_funds_reports"
LIMIT 100;Connecting to the DDN is easy. All you need is an existing SQL client that can connect to Postgres. As long as you have a SQL client ready, you'll be able to query wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem with SQL in under 60 seconds.
Query Your Local Engine
bash -c "$(curl -sL https://github.com/splitgraph/splitgraph/releases/latest/download/install.sh)"Read the installation docs.
Splitgraph Cloud is built around Splitgraph Core (GitHub), which includes a local Splitgraph Engine packaged as a Docker image. Splitgraph Cloud is basically a scaled-up version of that local Engine. When you query the Data Delivery Network or the REST API, we mount the relevant datasets in an Engine on our servers and execute your query on it.
It's possible to run this engine locally. You'll need a Mac, Windows or Linux system to install sgr, and a Docker installation to run the engine. You don't need to know how to actually use Docker; sgrcan manage the image, container and volume for you.
There are a few ways to ingest data into the local engine.
For external repositories, the Splitgraph Engine can "mount" upstream data sources by using sgr mount. This feature is built around Postgres Foreign Data Wrappers (FDW). You can write custom "mount handlers" for any upstream data source. For an example, we blogged about making a custom mount handler for HackerNews stories.
For hosted datasets (like this repository), where the author has pushed Splitgraph Images to the repository, you can "clone" and/or "checkout" the data using sgr cloneand sgr checkout.
Cloning Data
Because wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latest is a Splitgraph Image, you can clone the data from Spltgraph Cloud to your local engine, where you can query it like any other Postgres database, using any of your existing tools.
First, install Splitgraph if you haven't already.
Clone the metadata with sgr clone
This will be quick, and does not download the actual data.
sgr clone wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bemCheckout the data
Once you've cloned the data, you need to "checkout" the tag that you want. For example, to checkout the latest tag:
sgr checkout wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latestThis will download all the objects for the latest tag of wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem and load them into the Splitgraph Engine. Depending on your connection speed and the size of the data, you will need to wait for the checkout to complete. Once it's complete, you will be able to query the data like you would any other Postgres database.
Alternatively, use "layered checkout" to avoid downloading all the data
The data in wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latest is 0 bytes. If this is too big to download all at once, or perhaps you only need to query a subset of it, you can use a layered checkout.:
sgr checkout --layered wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem:latestThis will not download all the data, but it will create a schema comprised of foreign tables, that you can query as you would any other data. Splitgraph will lazily download the required objects as you query the data. In some cases, this might be faster or more efficient than a regular checkout.
Read the layered querying documentation to learn about when and why you might want to use layered queries.
Query the data with your existing tools
Once you've loaded the data into your local Splitgraph Engine, you can query it with any of your existing tools. As far as they're concerned, wa-gov/candidate-surplus-funds-reports-9kcu-2bem is just another Postgres schema.