Data Platforms

Data Engineer

Master distributed computing with Apache Spark, Airflow orchestration, dbt, SQL, and Snowflake/BigQuery.

Progression:0%
0 / 7 Milestones Mastered
L1

1. Beginner

Advanced SQL and Python data structures.

Advanced SQL & Window Functions

essential

PARTITION BY, CTEs, ROW_NUMBER vs DENSE_RANK, query execution plans.

Window functionsRecursive CTEsEXPLAIN ANALYZEBitmap index scans
L2

2. Foundation

Data modeling paradigms and file formats.

Data Modeling (Kimball Star & Snowflake Schema)

essential

Fact vs dimension tables, slowly changing dimensions (SCD 1, 2, 3), Parquet vs ORC.

Dimensional modelingSCD Type 2Columnar storage (Parquet)Snappy compression
L3

3. Core Skills

Distributed data processing engines.

Apache Spark & PySpark

essential

RDDs, DataFrames, catalyst optimizer, shuffles, partition skew mitigation.

Spark catalyst optimizerBroadcast joinsPartitioning & saltingLazy evaluation
L4

4. Framework

Pipeline orchestration and data transformation.

Apache Airflow & dbt

essential

DAG design, idempotency in pipelines, data testing, incremental models.

Airflow DAGsdbt snapshottingData quality testsBackfilling
L5

5. Real Projects

End-to-end data pipeline from raw events to analytical warehouse.

Streaming Financial Ticker Pipeline

essential

Kafka stream ingestion, Spark streaming aggregation, Delta Lake storage.

Structured StreamingDelta Lake ACIDWatermarking
L6

6. Advanced

Data mesh, lakehouses, and data governance.

Modern Data Lakehouse (Iceberg / Delta)

essential

Time travel queries, schema evolution, catalog management, data lineage.

Apache IcebergTime travelData catalogsGovernance & GDPR compliance
L7

7. Interview Prep

Pipeline design, data debugging, and SQL screening.

Data Pipeline System Design

essential

Designing metrics aggregation for 1B daily events, late arriving data.

Exact-once semanticsDeduplicationPartition pruning

Hands-on Portfolio Projects for this Roadmap

Clickstream Ingestion Pipeline with Kafka & ClickHouse
Automated dbt Data Mart for E-Commerce Revenue Metrics
Real-time Fraud Detection with Spark Structured Streaming