July 29-August 01, 2024 — 8.28 Release Notes

Attention

The release has completed.

For differences between the in-advance and final versions of these release notes, see Release notes change log.

SQL updates

New SQL functions

The following function(s) are now available with this release:

Function category

New function

Description

Semi-structured and structured

ARRAYS_ZIP

Returns an array of objects, each of which contains key-value pairs for an nth element in the input arrays.

CREATE and ALTER commands for replication and failover groups: Support added for tags

With this release, Snowflake adds support to set a tag on replication and failover groups as follows:

ALTER { REPLICATION | FAILOVER } GROUP <name>
    SET TAG <tag_name> = '<tag_value>' [ , <tag_name>= '<tag_value>'  ]

ALTER { REPLICATION | FAILOVER } GROUP <name>
    UNSET TAG <tag_name> [ , <tag_name>  ]

CREATE [ OR REPLACE ] { REPLICATION | FAILOVER } GROUP <name>
    ...
    ...
    [ [ WITH ] TAG ( <tag_name> = '<tag_value>' [ , <tag_name> = '<tag_value>' , ... ] ) ]
Copy

Where <tag_name> and <tag_value> specify the tag name (i.e. the key) and the tag value to set/unset for the replication or failover group:

  • The maximum number of unique tag keys that can be set on an object is 20.

  • The tag value is always a string, and the maximum number of characters for the tag value is 256.

Note

  • Tags are not set on any objects in the replication or failover group because these groups are not parents of other objects; tag lineage is not applicable.

  • You cannot set tags on the secondary replication or failover group because these objects are read-only.

  • If tags are set on the primary replication or failover group, these tags are set on the secondary failover or replication group when you refresh the secondary group.

For more information, see:

Account Usage: New SEARCH_OPTIMIZATION_BENEFITS view

With this release, we are pleased to announce the new SEARCH_OPTIMIZATION_BENEFITS view in the ACCOUNT_USAGE schema.

This view provides information about the number of partitions pruned specifically due to search optimization. This view is similar to the TABLE_PRUNING_HISTORY view but provides information about pruning due to search optimization.

For more information, see SEARCH_OPTIMIZATION_BENEFITS view.

Data governance updates

Object Tagging: Support added for replication and failover groups

With this release, Snowflake is pleased to announce that you can set tags on replication and failover groups.

For more information, see CREATE and ALTER commands for replication and failover groups: Support added for tags (in this topic).

Data Quality and data metric functions (DMFs) — General Availability

With this release, Snowflake is pleased to announce the general availability of Data Quality Monitoring with data metric functions (DMFs). Data Quality Monitoring uses DMFs to continuously monitor data quality metrics such as completeness, accuracy, uniqueness, and validity. You can use Snowflake provided system DMFs for common metrics such as row count, duplicates, and freshness. Alternatively, you can create your own custom DMFs to define metrics that are specific to your own data.

You can either use the DMF in a query to test the quality of data in your pipeline or associate the DMF to desired tables to continuously monitor its quality. The continuous monitoring can either be schedule-based for periodic measurement or trigger-based to measure only when the underlying table is modified.

Since announcing the preview availability in March, we’ve made the following updates:

  • New schema privilege: CREATE DATA METRIC FUNCTION. This is a change from the preview where you needed to use the CREATE FUNCTION privilege.

    Now, your role must have the CREATE DATA METRIC FUNCTION privilege to create a DMF.

  • New table function: DATA_QUALITY_MONITORING_RESULTS

  • Access control for the new table function.

  • Support added for new kinds of tables: dynamic table, materialized view, Apache Iceberg™ table, external table, event table, temporary table, and transient table.

  • Number of DMF associations increased to 10,000 per account.

  • System DMFs for statistics, which was announced in June.

For more information, see Introduction to Data Quality and data metric functions.

Data loading/unloading updates

Snowpipe: New output in SYSTEM$PIPE_STATUS

With this release, the output of the PIPE_STATUS system function includes a new field, syncHistoryRemainingEntries. When a pipe fails over, load history entries might continue to be replicated for the pipe, ensuring that changes from the last refresh operation are up to date. This new field can help you monitor the progress of load history replication for a pipe.

For more information, see SYSTEM$PIPE_STATUS.

Data pipelines updates

Dynamic tables: Support for incremental lateral flatten

With this release, you can now use lateral flatten with incremental refresh by setting the refresh mode to INCREMENTAL. Selecting the flatten SEQ column from a lateral flatten join is not supported for incremental refresh.

For more information, see Supported queries in incremental refresh.

Data lake updates

Apache Iceberg™ tables: Support for Polaris Catalog — Preview

With this release, Snowflake is pleased to announce the preview of support for integrating Apache Iceberg™ tables in Snowflake with Polaris Catalog.

Using a catalog integration configure for Polaris Catalog, you can do the following:

  • Query a table in Polaris Catalog using Snowflake.

  • Sync a Snowflake-managed Iceberg table with Polaris Catalog.

For more information, see Use Apache Iceberg™ tables with Polaris Catalog in Snowflake.

Release notes change log

Announcement

Update

Date

Release notes

Initial publication (preview)

27-Jul-24

Snowpipe: New output in SYSTEM$PIPE_STATUS

Added to Data loading / unloading updates section

30-Jul-24

Iceberg tables: Support for Polaris Catalog

Added to Data lake updates section

31-Jul-24