The term “data pipe” refers a series procedures that collect information and convert it into a format that is user-friendly. Pipelines can be real-time or batch. They can be used in the cloud or on premises and their tooling can be commercial or open source.

Data pipelines are like physical pipelines that carry water from a river into your home. They transfer data from one layer to another (data lakes or warehouses) like the physical pipe transports water from click for source the river to a residence. This helps enable analysis and insights from the data. In the past, data transfers required manual procedures like daily uploads of files, or long waiting times to get insights. Data pipelines are a replacement for manual processes and allow companies to transfer data more efficiently and without risk.

Accelerate development using a virtual data pipeline

A virtual data pipe can save a lot of money on infrastructure costs such as storage in the datacenter or in remote offices. It can also cut down on hardware, network and administration costs for non-production environments such as testing environments. Automation of data refresh, masking and access control by role and database customization and integration, can help to reduce time.

IBM InfoSphere Virtual Data Pipeline is a multicloud copy management solution which decouples development and test environments from production infrastructures. It uses patented snapshot and changed-block tracking technology to capture application-consistent copies of databases and other files. Users can mount masked, fast virtual copies of databases in non-production environments, and begin testing in minutes. This is particularly beneficial for accelerating DevOps agile methodologies, and speeding the time to market.