# Getting started with the Snowflake PT-2: Loading data

> This is content from just-tim, the data-and-analytics channel by Tim Ngwena (formerly 'Tableau Tim'). Tim has 12+ years of hands-on BI experience and covers Tableau most of all, plus Power BI, Looker, Hex, SQL and data modelling, the analytics industry, and the craft of doing the job — always tool-agnostic and honest about the trade-offs.

- **Author:** Tim Ngwena (just-tim, https://just-tim.com/about)
- **Published:** 2021-05-09
- **Format:** Video · 54 min watch · transcript available
- **Topics:** Data engineering, Data prep
- **Tools:** Snowflake (databases, stages, tables, warehouses); SQL (copy into)
- **Canonical:** https://just-tim.com/posts/getting-started-with-the-snowflake-pt-2-loading-data
- **Watch:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6tqms7PhN8

I continue my Snowflake learning series by working through the official 'Getting started with Snowflake' lab, focusing on loading data. I tour the web interface, explain how warehouses work, then create a database, table, external S3 stage and file format before loading the CityBike trip data and debugging a compression issue.

## Key takeaways

- Snowflake 'warehouses' aren't storage in the traditional sense — they're compute units you size (XS to 4XL) for performance, and you're charged based on usage rather than flat storage.
- Loading data follows a clear sequence: create a database and table, create an external stage pointing to the S3 bucket, define a file format, then COPY INTO the table.
- You can do everything via the visual UI or via SQL — the lab worksheet provides ready-made scripts, but you must run sections one at a time and never tick 'run all queries'.
- An external stage just tells Snowflake where your source data lives (e.g. an S3 bucket) before it's loaded in, acting as a holding area.
- When a COPY fails on a gzip file, the UI-created file format may not apply compression correctly — running the provided SQL to create the file format fixed the load.

## Chapters

- 0:00 Finding the getting started guide
- 1:18 Sample SQL scripts and trial setup
- 4:20 Touring the Snowflake interface
- 5:51 Databases, shares and marketplace
- 9:44 How warehouses and compute work
- 15:20 Worksheets and the history tab
- 21:06 Preparing to load the CityBike data
- 22:30 Creating the database and table
- 24:16 Setting the worksheet context
- 32:03 Creating an external S3 stage
- 37:33 Creating a file format
- 41:07 Loading data and debugging the error

Watch the full video, read the transcript and use chapter deep-links on the page: https://just-tim.com/posts/getting-started-with-the-snowflake-pt-2-loading-data

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just-tim — Data and analytics, with a point of view. · https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7HYxRWmaNlJux-X7rNLZyw · https://twitter.com/TableauTim · https://www.linkedin.com/in/timngwena