Coalesce

My main use case for Coalesce.io  was with a healthcare provider client whose team was not particularly tech savvy, so we wanted something easy to use. I was debating between two options: Coalesce.io  and DBT. Coalesce.io had a GUI interface where I could drag and drop objects and build easily, so I was exploring it for building data vault models.

For that specific use case, I was able to accomplish what I was trying to do during the demo, but we encountered certain scenarios such as post-hooks, update statements, edge cases, or particular SQL query modifications and custom cases that could not be implemented through the GUI interface. Additionally, jobs that were interdependent on each other and orchestration features were not available at that time, which made us reconsider our options and ultimately go with DBT since it was open source and DBT Cloud had all the features we wanted.

I used Coalesce.io to build a data vault model by reaching out to the Coalesce.io team when the initial account provided to us did not have access to packages used for data vault modeling. They enabled a package specific for data vault modeling within the account. In that specific scenario, we wanted to replicate or build a small demo for the client to show them how we could leverage Coalesce.io to build data vault models. In data vault, we have a use case of needing to build multiple objects for creating dimensions and facts with an intermediate layer of hubs, links, and satellites. We used the package provided by the Coalesce.io team, which streamlined the process of creating these objects and provided a template that had all these columns in a particular format. We only needed to enter the column names and drag and drop to create our final model, which was very convenient. However, there were some problems and nuances due to which we went with DBT.

Some of the best features that Coalesce.io offers include the easy graphical interface where I can see the data flow, lineage graph, and how the data is moving from the source to the end target table. It has an easy drag and drop interface so I do not need to write SQL queries. Especially for my use case of data vault modeling, which required a lot of coding, using Coalesce.io would reduce the development process and I could quickly develop models.

Coalesce.io has positively impacted my organization by being a tool that can be leveraged by a non-technical team, especially business analysts who are working on bringing data from different sources. This is particularly beneficial for those who do not prefer coding or want to build their data models as quickly as possible. That is what I would consider to be the best use case for any organization.

Coalesce.io can be improved by making it handle more edge cases and providing better documentation. When I was initially working and trying to find information, there was not much available on their official website. Documentation with screenshots and steps on how to leverage this tool should be developed. An online community was not present either, which would help users deal with any issues or errors they are facing or ask developmental questions related to edge cases that are not generally used. I believe those are some of the things that can help the community of developers using Coalesce.io.

I have been using Coalesce.io for two months for a demo in my previous company.

I cannot think of anything else to add about the features since I used it only for two months, and it has been a while since I used it.

I saw measurable benefits during my demo since I found that the general impression was that I was developing much faster, and the development time was saved significantly. Work that could take me a day could be done in an hour or so, so I believe time saving is the most important factor.

I did not explore Coalesce.io's AI capabilities much, so I cannot provide an opinion on its governance and security.

While I was using Coalesce.io, it was a very new tool and I did not come across its AI capabilities, because it was mostly an open account I was using and it did not have those capabilities at that point in time, which was around last year, probably in 2024. So it did not have many capabilities at that point in time.

I would rate this product a six out of ten.

I have used Coalesce.io  for one year and twelve months, setting up a data pipeline for the student survey system at the University of Sydney.

The main use case for Coalesce.io  is the developed data pipeline that was used by Coalesce.

We had an Oracle database that I connected, and for orchestration, we used Control-M . For the pipeline development in terms of setting up the workflows, we used Coalesce.io.

The best features Coalesce.io offers include lineage and ease of use, allowing us to easily create workflows in both the dev, test, and prod environments, and we were able to replicate those fairly quickly and create those pipelines much more easily.

The lineage feature helped our team significantly because once we completed the project and it was given off to the data engineering team, they were able to follow the workflows, which was a very big plus. We did not have to do an extensive amount of documentation, and all of that was embedded in the workflows and very easy to provide information to the data engineering team for business as usual.

Coalesce.io has positively impacted my organization by allowing us rapid build of data pipelines so that workflows and deploying the solution much more quickly increased the velocity of implementation.

Some of the improvements for Coalesce.io could be related to the artificial intelligence feature, perhaps some sort of a wrapper around it.

If the AI-driven feature is embedded, it can guide workflows and make the pipeline development even much faster, acting as an agent that assists people to develop in hours rather than in months. That would be a great improvement.

I have used Coalesce.io for one year and twelve months, setting up a data pipeline for the student survey system at the University of Sydney.

My advice for others looking into using Coalesce.io is to give it a go and compare it against other pipeline tools such as DBT, Fabric , or Databricks  to see how it stacks up. My review rating for Coalesce.io is eight out of ten.