As an ETL testing engineer using Python, you'll want to focus on libraries and
concepts that help you automate data validation, comparison, and manipulation.
Here's a breakdown of topics to learn:
1. Python Fundamentals (Essential):
● Basic Syntax: Variables, data types (strings, integers, lists, dictionaries, tuples),
operators, control flow (loops, conditionals).
● Functions: Defining and calling functions, passing arguments, return values.
● Modules and Packages: Importing and using standard library modules and
external packages.
● File Handling: Reading and writing files (CSV, JSON, text).
● Error Handling: Using try-except blocks to handle exceptions.
● Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) Basics: Classes, objects, inheritance
(helpful but not strictly required for basic ETL testing).
2. Data Manipulation and Analysis Libraries:
● Pandas:
○ DataFrames and Series: Working with tabular data.
○ Data cleaning and transformation: Handling missing values, filtering, sorting,
merging, joining.
○ Data aggregation and summarization: Grouping, pivoting, calculating
statistics.
○ Reading and writing data from various formats (CSV, Excel, SQL databases).
● NumPy:
○ Arrays: Working with multi-dimensional arrays.
○ Numerical operations: Mathematical functions, linear algebra.
● SQLAlchemy (or similar):
○ Connecting to databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQL Server, etc.).
○ Executing SQL queries.
○ Fetching and manipulating data from databases.
● PySpark (if dealing with Big Data):
○ Spark DataFrames: Distributed data processing.
○ Spark SQL: Writing SQL queries against Spark DataFrames.
○ Working with large datasets.
3. Data Validation and Comparison:
● Data Validation Techniques:
○Schema validation: Ensuring data conforms to expected structure.
○ Data type validation: Verifying data types.
○ Range validation: Checking data within specified ranges.
○ Null/empty value checks.
○ Duplicate value checks.
○ Business rule validation: Implementing custom validation logic.
● Data Comparison:
○ Comparing data between source and target systems.
○ Identifying data discrepancies.
○ Generating data difference reports.
● Libraries for Comparison and Assertions:
○ unittest or pytest: For writing unit tests and assertions.
○ deepdiff: For detailed comparison of dictionaries and other data structures.
4. Database Interaction:
● SQL Queries: Writing efficient SQL queries for data extraction and validation.
● Database Connections: Establishing and managing database connections.
● Data Integrity Checks: Implementing SQL queries to check data integrity
constraints.
5. ETL Testing Specifics:
● Source-to-Target Data Validation:
○ Ensuring data is correctly transformed and loaded.
○ Validating data transformations and aggregations.
● Data Quality Testing:
○ Identifying data quality issues (missing values, inconsistencies, duplicates).
○ Implementing data quality metrics.
● Performance Testing (Basic):
○ Measuring ETL process execution time.
○ Identifying performance bottlenecks.
● Data Profiling:
○ Understanding data characteristics (distribution, patterns).
○ Generating data profiles.
6. Automation and Reporting:
● Test Automation Frameworks (e.g., using pytest):
○ Writing reusable test cases.
○Organizing tests into suites.
○ Generating test reports.
● Reporting Libraries:
○ Generating reports (e.g., HTML, CSV) to summarize test results.
○ Emailing reports.
● Scheduling:
○ Using tools like Airflow, or python libraries like schedule to run tests on a
schedule.
Example workflow elements to practice:
● Read data from a CSV file, transform it using Pandas, and load it into a database.
● Compare data from two database tables and generate a report of differences.
● Write unit tests to validate data transformation logic.
● Automate the process of validating that a JSON file matches a database table.
● Create a python script that profiles a database table and generates a report.
