Overview
Welcome to the Strata Developer Guide. These docs help you get familiar with the Strata CLI and with building semantic models for Strata.
What is Strata?
Strata is a semantic layer platform for self-service BI and data warehouse access. It transforms raw database tables into a governed, business-ready semantic layer so domain experts can explore your data warehouse and export to Excel or Sheets—without SQL or data-team tickets.
Key Features:
- Semantic modeling: Define business-friendly fields, metrics, and relationships in YAML
- Query optimization: Automatic SQL generation with cost-based routing
- Multi-datasource: Query across multiple databases seamlessly
- Self-service BI: Domain experts explore data without writing SQL
- Version control: Track changes with migrations and Git
Your Journey
To begin working with Strata, follow these steps:
- Install Strata CLI — Install the command-line tool on your system
- Core Concepts — Understand semantic layer, tables, relationships, and datasources before you build
- Quickstart — Build your first semantic model step-by-step (assumes you've read concepts)
We put concepts before the quickstart so you know what a datasource, table, and relationship are when the tutorial asks you to add or create them. If you prefer to try first, you can jump to the quickstart and follow the links in each step for deeper explanation.
What You'll Build
With Strata, you'll define a semantic model that:
- Transforms technical column names into business-friendly fields
- Defines relationships between tables
- Creates reusable metrics and calculations
- Enables self-service BI for your team
Next Steps
Ready to get started? Install Strata CLI, then read Core Concepts and run the Quickstart to create your first semantic model.