Touchdown a Knowledge Engineer Position: Free Programs and Certifications

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Folks say it is best to contemplate worth for cash when shopping for issues. Nonetheless, the perfect worth for cash is getting one thing good for free. However do such issues exist? Supposedly not, if we go by the saying, “No such factor as a free lunch.”

I declare there’s a free lunch, and I’m about to show it! I dug out 10 instructional ‘free lunches’ – free information engineering programs that additionally present high quality data.  It’s true; there’s far more selection and selection when you can or wish to pay tens, lots of, typically even 1000’s of {dollars}.

Many such programs are thought-about free on another free course lists. Paying $90 one-off or $45/month is free to some folks. However many individuals don’t have that cash for a ‘free’ course, regardless of being very keen to be taught information engineering. (Additionally, let’s get actual! Free actually means, properly, free! Not ‘low-cost’, not ‘little or no cash’, or ‘reasonably priced’. Free!)

From what I researched, these programs actually are free. Many are from edX. In the event you select free entry to the course, you need to full it in a sure time, normally round six months. However that must be sufficient to finish each course comfortably. Additionally, free entry means you don’t get lifetime entry to all of the supplies (they’re deleted when you end) and don’t get a certificates. Regardless of this, it is best to be capable of use these programs to find out about information engineering.

Earlier than I speak in regards to the programs, let’s briefly overview the data engineer’s role. That manner, understanding what to search for in programs shall be simpler.

Understanding the Position of a Knowledge Engineer

Very merely, information engineers are in control of making information accessible to information group members and different stakeholders. In doing so, they wrangle information and construct and preserve information infrastructure, e.g., ETL course of, information pipelines, information storage.

Naturally, the programs ought to cowl all or a few of these abilities. Let’s take a better take a look at the programs – pun meant – that can comprise your instructional free lunch.

Free Knowledge Engineering Programs

1. Knowledge Engineering by ASU

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 5 weeks at 1-9 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: This introductory-level course by Arizona State College focuses on working with databases in information engineering and easy methods to work together with them utilizing SQL. You’ll find out about database construction, the star schema, and becoming a member of information from a number of tables. Within the remaining stage, you’ll discover ways to create studies with SQL and write scripts for information processing.

2. Python and Pandas for Knowledge Engineering by Pragmatic AI Labs

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 4 weeks at 3-6 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: In yet one more introductory edX course, you’ll be taught Python and pandas for information engineering. The introduction to Python consists of matters akin to easy statements, if statements, whereas loops, and features. Then, you’ll find out about information manipulation in Pandas (notably DataFrames) and its alternate options, akin to NumPy, Spark, and PySpark. Within the final module, you’ll find out about Python improvement environments and model management.

3. Scripting with Python and SQL for Knowledge Engineering by Pragmatic AI Labs

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 4 weeks at 3-6 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: If you wish to be taught SQL and Python for information engineering concurrently, that is the course for you. You’ll use Python’s built-in information constructions to govern information and write Python scripts for information job automation. The course additionally teaches you net scraping and utilizing SQLite to retailer and question information in Python. Concerning SQL, you’ll discover ways to import and export information from MySQL database and easy methods to execute MySQL queries in VSCode.

4. Cloud Knowledge Engineering by Pragmatic AI Labs

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 4 weeks at 3-6 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: This course will educate you information engineering within the cloud. You’ll find out about methodologies in information engineering, develop distributed techniques, serverless information engineering techniques, and cloud ETL pipelines, and find out about information governance. Within the course of, you’ll get in contact with applied sciences akin to:

• CUDA
• Numba
• ASICs
• Colab Professional
• Colab API
• Google BigQuery
• AWS
• Databricks SQL
• Click on
• Python
• Rust

That is additionally an introductory course with no stipulations wanted.

5. Constructing ETL and Knowledge Pipelines with Bash, Airflow and Kafka by IBM

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 5 weeks at 2-4 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: This information engineering course focuses on constructing ETL and information pipelines. In the course of the course, you’ll be taught what ETL and ELT processes are, create ETL utilizing Bash shell scripts, use Apache Airflow to create batch information pipelines, and Apache Kafka for streaming information pipelines.

That is an introductory course to those matters however requires expertise working with relational databases, SQL, and Bash shell scripting.

6. Knowledge Warehousing and BI Analytics by IBM

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 6 weeks at 2-3 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: This intermediate course by IBM teaches you the necessities of information warehouses, information marts, and information lakes. You’ll discover ways to design, mannequin, and implement information warehouses. Extra particularly, you’ll use CUBEs, ROLLUPs, materialized views, and tables. You’ll additionally find out about details and dimensional modeling, information modeling with star and snowflake schemas, staging areas for information warehouses, information high quality, and populating a knowledge warehouse with information. Within the third module, you’ll work on information warehouse analytics in Cognos Analytics.

The course requires expertise with SQL and relational databases.

7. Apache Spark for Knowledge Engineering and Machine Studying by IBM

Platform and hyperlink to the course: edX

Period: 3 weeks at 2-3 hours/week; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: One more intermediate course. It focuses on instructing Apache Spark. It’s an necessary instrument in information engineering, so that you’ll find out about Spark Structured Streaming, GraphFrames, ETL course of, and ML pipelines. As well as, you’ll be taught ML fundamentals, akin to regression, classification, and clustering.

The course requires foundational Apache Spark data. It’s additionally prompt that you simply full the Big Data, Hadoop and Spark Basics course by IBM.

8. DE Zoomcamp

Platform and hyperlink to the course: DataTalks.Club

Period: 10 weeks; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: Lastly, a course from a unique platform! This on-line boot camp will give you complete information engineering data. It’ll educate you containerization and infrastructure, workflow orchestration, information warehousing, analytics engineering, batch processing, and streaming. You’ll be launched to applied sciences akin to Google Cloud Platform, Terraform, Docker, SQL, Mage, dbt, Apache Spark, and Apache Kafka.

The stipulations for this bootcamp are the SQL fundamentals. Additionally, it’s preferable that you’ve got expertise with Python or, if not, another programming language.

9. DE Finish-to-Finish Tasks

Platform and hyperlink to the course: DE Academy

Period: No information.

Description: It is a project-based undertaking during which you’ll discover ways to use AWS, Snowflake, Python,Kafka, Azure, Databricks, Airflow, and Tableau. You’ll analyze and rework information, migrate it, and streamline workflows.

10. Scala Programming for Knowledge Science

Platform and hyperlink to the course: Cognitive Class AI

Period: 20 hours; be taught at your personal tempo

Description: This studying path consists of three programs. The primary is Scala 101, which is able to educate you the fundamentals of object-oriented programming, case objects & lessons, collections, and idiomatic Scala. Within the second course, Spark Overview for Scala Analytics, you’ll be launched to Apache Spark, RDDs, DataFrames for large-scale information science, and superior Spark matters (e.g., Hive with Spark, Spark streaming). The third course is about Scala in information science, the place you’ll be taught fundamental statistics and information sorts, easy methods to put together information, engineer options, match a mannequin, construct a pipeline, and carry out grid search.

Conclusion

No shock that it’s simpler when you’ve got cash – you get entry to extra programs which are extra numerous. Yeah, it sucks not having cash! However this doesn’t imply you need to say goodbye to your dream of touchdown a knowledge engineer function.

It’s a lot more durable to seek out them, however there are nonetheless some good programs that may educate you fundamental and extra superior information engineering. I discovered ten of them. Another free assets, akin to blogs or YouTube movies, will help you attain the required stage of data.

In the event you’re industrious sufficient, devoted, and chronic, I’m positive you’ll be able to land a knowledge engineering function totally free.

Nate Rosidi is a knowledge scientist and in product technique. He is additionally an adjunct professor instructing analytics, and is the founding father of StrataScratch, a platform serving to information scientists put together for his or her interviews with actual interview questions from high corporations. Nate writes on the most recent traits within the profession market, provides interview recommendation, shares information science tasks, and covers the whole lot SQL.