Alex Merced — Developer and technical writer sharing in-depth insights on data engineering, Apache Iceberg, data lakehouse architectures, Python tooling, and modern analytics platforms, with a strong focus on practical, hands-on learning.
610 articles from this blog
Explains mathematically why traditional lakehouses fail AI agents and introduces the agentic lakehouse concept.
Explores zero-ETL federation as a real-time data access method for AI agents, replacing batch ETL to enable live cross-enterprise analytics.
Explores how agentic AI auto-heals and protects enterprise data pipelines by replacing static alerts with autonomous monitoring and recovery.
Explains the architecture of agentic analytics systems, focusing on the ReAct reasoning loop, tool access, error handling, and multi-agent setups.
Guide to Apache Iceberg v3 features including deletion vectors, new data types, encryption, and upgrade planning for production workloads.
Tutorial on building a custom agentic analytics system using Python, LangChain, and Dremio SQL data lakes for automated SQL investigation.
A guide to preventing data swamps in lakehouses through active governance, metadata stewardship, schema evolution safety, and drift detection.
Explains how Apache Iceberg enables hybrid-cloud analytics for regulated markets by separating storage, compute, and catalog.
Guide to securing Apache Iceberg tables with row/column-level access control using Apache Polaris and query engine policies.
Best practices for managing Apache Iceberg snapshot expiration in data lakehouses to optimize query performance and metadata size.
Explores how Apache Iceberg decouples storage and compute for cost optimization, including multi-engine routing and TCO analysis.
A step-by-step playbook for migrating from legacy data warehouses to open lakehouses, covering inventory, architecture, and trust-building.
Explains designing an open catalog architecture for AI agents in an agentic lakehouse, covering Apache Polaris and Dremio's Open Catalog.
A detailed comparison of total cost of ownership between open lakehouse and proprietary data warehouse architectures.
Explores achieving sub-second BI queries on Apache Iceberg data lakehouses by addressing object storage latency through file layout optimization and caching.
Explores agentic analytics, an AI-driven approach that replaces passive BI dashboards with autonomous agents for goal-directed data investigation.
Explains how a semantic layer bridges natural language and SQL, enabling AI agents to translate business questions into accurate queries.
Guide to using Hermes Agent for free with DeepSeek V4 and Slack integration, enabling a zero-cost AI coding assistant.
Comparison of Iceberg catalog control planes: Polaris, Unity Catalog, and Cloud REST for lakehouse architecture.
A guide on automating Iceberg table maintenance to prevent small file accumulation, covering compaction, vacuuming, and modern tools.
