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In this section, we provide guides and references to use the Nifi connector.

Configure and schedule Nifi metadata workflows from the OpenMetadata UI:

Ingestion Deployment

To run the Ingestion via the UI you'll need to use the OpenMetadata Ingestion Container, which comes shipped with custom Airflow plugins to handle the workflow deployment. If you want to install it manually in an already existing Airflow host, you can follow this guide.

If you don't want to use the OpenMetadata Ingestion container to configure the workflows via the UI, then you can check the following docs to run the Ingestion Framework in any orchestrator externally.

Run Connectors from the OpenMetadata UI

Learn how to manage your deployment to run connectors from the UI

Run the Connector Externally

Get the YAML to run the ingestion externally

External Schedulers

Get more information about running the Ingestion Framework Externally

Requirements

Metadata

OpenMetadata supports 2 types of connection for the Nifi connector:

  • basic authentication: use username/password to authenticate to Nifi.
  • client certificate authentication: use CA, client certificate and client key files to authenticate.

The user should be able to send request to the Nifi API and access the Resources endpoint.

Metadata Ingestion

1. Visit the Services Page

The first step is to ingest the metadata from your sources. To do that, you first need to create a Service connection first.

This Service will be the bridge between OpenMetadata and your source system.

Once a Service is created, it can be used to configure your ingestion workflows.

Visit Services Page

Select your Service Type and Add a New Service

2. Create a New Service

Click on Add New Service to start the Service creation.

Create a new Service

Add a new Service from the Services page

3. Select the Service Type

Select Nifi as the Service type and click Next.

Select Service

Select your Service from the list

4. Name and Describe your Service

Provide a name and description for your Service.

Service Name

OpenMetadata uniquely identifies Services by their Service Name. Provide a name that distinguishes your deployment from other Services, including the other Nifi Services that you might be ingesting metadata from.

Note that when the name is set, it cannot be changed.

Add New Service

Provide a Name and description for your Service

5. Configure the Service Connection

In this step, we will configure the connection settings required for Nifi.

Please follow the instructions below to properly configure the Service to read from your sources. You will also find helper documentation on the right-hand side panel in the UI.

Configure Service connection

Configure the Service connection by filling the form

Connection Details

  • Host and Port: Pipeline Service Management/UI URI. This should be specified as a string in the format 'hostname:port'.

  • Nifi Config: OpenMetadata supports username/password or client certificate authentication.

    1. Basic Authentication
      • Username: Username to connect to Nifi. This user should be able to send request to the Nifi API and access the Resources endpoint.
      • Password: Password to connect to Nifi.
      • Verify SSL: Whether SSL verification should be perform when authenticating.
    2. Client Certificate Authentication
      • Certificate Authority Path: Path to the certificate authority (CA) file. This is the certificate used to store and issue your digital certificate. This is an optional parameter. If omitted SSL verification will be skipped; this can present some sever security issue. important: This file should be accessible from where the ingestion workflow is running. For example, if you are using OpenMetadata Ingestion Docker container, this file should be in this container.
      • Client Certificate Path: Path to the certificate client file. important: This file should be accessible from where the ingestion workflow is running. For example, if you are using OpenMetadata Ingestion Docker container, this file should be in this container.
      • Client Key Path: Path to the client key file. important: This file should be accessible from where the ingestion workflow is running. For example, if you are using OpenMetadata Ingestion Docker container, this file should be in this container.

6. Test the Connection

Once the credentials have been added, click on Test Connection and Save the changes.

Test Connection

Test the connection and save the Service

7. Configure Metadata Ingestion

In this step we will configure the metadata ingestion pipeline, Please follow the instructions below

Configure Metadata Ingestion

Configure Metadata Ingestion Page

Metadata Ingestion Options

  • Name: This field refers to the name of ingestion pipeline, you can customize the name or use the generated name.
  • Pipeline Filter Pattern (Optional): Use to pipeline filter patterns to control whether or not to include pipeline as part of metadata ingestion.
    • Include: Explicitly include pipeline by adding a list of comma-separated regular expressions to the Include field. OpenMetadata will include all pipeline with names matching one or more of the supplied regular expressions. All other schemas will be excluded.
    • Exclude: Explicitly exclude pipeline by adding a list of comma-separated regular expressions to the Exclude field. OpenMetadata will exclude all pipeline with names matching one or more of the supplied regular expressions. All other schemas will be included.
  • Include lineage (toggle): Set the Include lineage toggle to control whether to include lineage between pipelines and data sources as part of metadata ingestion.
  • Enable Debug Log (toggle): Set the Enable Debug Log toggle to set the default log level to debug.
  • Mark Deleted Pipelines (toggle): Set the Mark Deleted Pipelines toggle to flag pipelines as soft-deleted if they are not present anymore in the source system.

8. Schedule the Ingestion and Deploy

Scheduling can be set up at an hourly, daily, weekly, or manual cadence. The timezone is in UTC. Select a Start Date to schedule for ingestion. It is optional to add an End Date.

Review your configuration settings. If they match what you intended, click Deploy to create the service and schedule metadata ingestion.

If something doesn't look right, click the Back button to return to the appropriate step and change the settings as needed.

After configuring the workflow, you can click on Deploy to create the pipeline.

Schedule the Workflow

Schedule the Ingestion Pipeline and Deploy

9. View the Ingestion Pipeline

Once the workflow has been successfully deployed, you can view the Ingestion Pipeline running from the Service Page.

View Ingestion Pipeline

View the Ingestion Pipeline from the Service Page

Troubleshooting

Workflow Deployment Error

If there were any errors during the workflow deployment process, the Ingestion Pipeline Entity will still be created, but no workflow will be present in the Ingestion container.

  • You can then Edit the Ingestion Pipeline and Deploy it again.
  • From the Connection tab, you can also Edit the Service if needed.