learn.fttgsolutions.com · The Stack
Data & Business Intelligence
70% Business Understanding · 30% Tools.
Spreadsheets
| Excel | Microsoft's spreadsheet — still the most widely used data tool in the world, especially in enterprise. |
| Google Sheets | Browser-based spreadsheets with real-time collaboration — great for lightweight data work and sharing. |
| Airtable | A spreadsheet-database hybrid — structured data with a friendly UI, popular for no-code workflows. |
SQL Databases
| PostgreSQL | The most powerful open-source SQL database — handles complex queries, JSON, and scales well. |
| MySQL | The world's most-used open-source database — fast, reliable, and the backbone of most web apps. |
| SQL Server | Microsoft's enterprise database — common in corporate environments and integrates natively with Power BI. |
| Oracle | Enterprise-grade database used by large corporations — powerful but expensive and complex to operate. |
| SQLite | A lightweight file-based database — perfect for local apps, mobile, and rapid prototyping. |
Cloud Warehouses
| Snowflake | Cloud data warehouse that separates storage and compute — pay per query, scales instantly. |
| BigQuery | Google's serverless data warehouse — query terabytes of data with SQL in seconds. |
| Amazon Redshift | AWS's columnar data warehouse built for large-scale analytics workloads. |
| Azure Synapse | Microsoft's unified analytics platform combining SQL warehouse and Spark in one service. |
| Databricks SQL | SQL layer on top of Databricks — run analytical queries against your data lakehouse. |
Data Lake / Lakehouse
| Databricks | Unified platform for data engineering, ML, and analytics — built on Apache Spark. |
| Delta Lake | Open storage format that adds ACID transactions and versioning to your data lake. |
| Apache Iceberg | Open table format for huge analytic datasets — enables time travel and schema evolution. |
| Amazon S3 | AWS object storage — the backbone of most cloud data lakes, storing files cheaply at scale. |
| Azure Data Lake | Microsoft's cloud storage service optimised for big data analytics workloads. |
Data Ingestion
| Fivetran | Automated pipelines that sync your SaaS tools and databases into your warehouse — no code required. |
| Airbyte | Open-source EL tool with 300+ connectors — move data from any source to your warehouse. |
| Stitch | Simple cloud ETL for developers — connects data sources to your warehouse in minutes. |
| Matillion | Low-code ETL built for cloud warehouses — visual pipelines for Snowflake, BigQuery, and Redshift. |
| Hevo Data | No-code real-time data pipeline that loads data from 150+ sources into your warehouse. |
Data Transformation
| dbt | Transforms raw warehouse data using SQL — handles testing, docs, and deployment of your data models. |
| Dataform | Google's SQL-based transformation tool — similar to dbt, natively integrated with BigQuery. |
| Coalesce | Visual data transformation platform purpose-built for Snowflake — drag-and-drop with SQL underneath. |
| SQLMesh | Next-gen transformation framework with built-in testing, environments, and incremental models. |
| Alteryx | No-code/low-code analytics automation — drag-and-drop workflow builder for data prep and blending. |
Programming Languages
| SQL | The language of data — used to query, filter, join, and aggregate data from any relational database. |
| Python | The most versatile language for data work — used for cleaning, analysis, automation, and ML. |
| R | Statistical computing language — preferred by data scientists for statistical analysis and visualisation. |
| Julia | High-performance language for scientific computing — as fast as C but as readable as Python. |
Python Libraries
| Pandas | Python's core data manipulation library — load, clean, filter, and reshape any dataset with DataFrames. |
| NumPy | Fast numerical computing in Python — the foundation beneath pandas, scipy, and machine learning. |
| Polars | Lightning-fast DataFrame library written in Rust — 10-100x faster than pandas for large datasets. |
| PySpark | Python API for Apache Spark — distributed data processing for datasets too large for one machine. |
| DuckDB | In-process SQL analytics engine — query CSVs and Parquet files at Spark speeds, zero setup. |
BI & Dashboarding
| Power BI | Microsoft's drag-and-drop dashboard tool — connects to any source and publishes reports across your org. |
| Tableau | Industry-leading visual analytics — turns complex data into interactive, shareable dashboards. |
| Looker Studio | Google's free dashboarding tool — connects to BigQuery, Sheets, and 800+ data sources. |
| Qlik Sense | Associative analytics platform — lets users explore data relationships without predefined queries. |
| Metabase | Open-source BI tool teams can self-host — lets non-technical users ask questions of their database. |
| Apache Superset | Open-source data exploration and dashboarding — powerful, free alternative to Tableau. |
Visualization Libs
| Matplotlib | Python's foundational plotting library — full control over every chart element, verbose but powerful. |
| Seaborn | Statistical visualisation library built on Matplotlib — beautiful defaults for common chart types. |
| Plotly | Interactive chart library for Python and JS — hover, zoom, and filter directly in the chart. |
| Altair | Declarative visualisation library based on Vega-Lite — clean grammar for statistical charts. |
| Bokeh | Interactive web-ready visualisations in Python — great for building dashboards in the browser. |
Product Analytics
| Mixpanel | Event-based product analytics — track exactly what users do in your app and build funnels. |
| Amplitude | Product analytics platform focused on user behaviour — helps teams understand what drives retention. |
| PostHog | Open-source product analytics with feature flags and session replay — self-hostable and privacy-friendly. |
| Heap | Auto-captures every user interaction — no manual event tracking, retroactively analyse any behaviour. |
| Google Analytics | Web analytics platform — tracks traffic, sessions, and conversions across your website. |
Data Notebooks
| Jupyter | The standard interactive notebook for data science — mix code, output, and markdown in one document. |
| Google Colab | Free cloud-hosted Jupyter notebooks with GPU access — no setup, runs straight in your browser. |
| Hex | Collaborative data notebook with a polished app-publishing layer — built for data teams. |
| Deepnote | Real-time collaborative data notebook — like Google Docs, but for data science. |
| Observable | JavaScript-based reactive notebooks — best for interactive data visualisation in the browser. |
Workflow Orchestration
| Apache Airflow | Python-based scheduler for data pipelines — define DAGs to run, monitor, and retry jobs automatically. |
| Dagster | Modern data orchestration — asset-first approach with built-in lineage and observability. |
| Prefect | Python-first workflow orchestration — simpler than Airflow with a clean UI and cloud option. |
| Mage | Modern pipeline tool with a visual editor — combines notebook-style development with orchestration. |
Data Quality
| Great Expectations | Python library for validating your data — write expectations, run tests automatically in your pipeline. |
| Soda | SQL-based data quality testing — define checks in YAML and monitor your data contracts. |
| Monte Carlo | Data observability platform — detects data incidents before they reach dashboards or models. |
| Anomalo | AI-powered data quality monitoring — automatically learns your data patterns and alerts on anomalies. |
| Telmai | No-code data observability — monitors pipelines and flags quality issues in real-time. |
Data Governance
| Atlan | Active data catalogue — connects your data assets, lineage, and documentation in one searchable hub. |
| Alation | Enterprise data catalogue — helps teams find, understand, and govern data assets across the org. |
| Collibra | Data governance platform for large enterprises — manages data policies, ownership, and compliance. |
| Microsoft Purview | Microsoft's unified data governance solution — maps and classifies data across Azure and beyond. |
| DataHub | Open-source metadata platform from LinkedIn — discover and understand data assets across your stack. |
Reverse ETL
| Hightouch | Syncs your warehouse data to CRMs, ad platforms, and 200+ destinations — no custom pipelines needed. |
| Census | Pushes your warehouse models into Salesforce, HubSpot, and any SaaS tool your team uses. |
| RudderStack | Open-source customer data platform — collects, transforms, and routes event data to any destination. |
| Grouparoo | Open-source reverse ETL for syncing warehouse data to marketing and sales tools. |
AI Analytics
| ChatGPT | OpenAI's AI — used to write SQL, explain data, generate reports, and automate analysis workflows. |
| Claude | Anthropic's AI — strong at reasoning through complex data problems and writing clean, documented code. |
| Gemini | Google's multimodal AI — integrates with BigQuery and Sheets for AI-assisted data workflows. |
| Power BI Copilot | Microsoft's AI layer in Power BI — generate reports and DAX measures using natural language. |
| ThoughtSpot Sage | AI-powered search analytics — ask questions of your data in plain English, get instant answers. |