The metastore

ado uses a SQL database to store resource definitions and SQLSampleStores. When you execute ado commands like get or describe they are interacting with this metastore.

By hosting a metastore on a dedicated server ado can be used by multiple distributed users.

Contexts and Projects¶

An instance of the metastore can host one or more projects. To access a project you create a context which contains location information, and optionally access credentials, for the project.

Contexts for local projects¶

Local projects are stored in local metastores. Local metastores use SQLite. A local metastore can hold a single project. Hence, there is one database per local metastore instance that contains the resources associated with this project.

A context for a local metastore looks like:

project: local-test
metadataStore:
  path: $HOME/Library/Application Support/ado/databases/local-test.db
  sslVerify: false

Contexts for remote projects¶

Remote projects are stored in remote metastores. Remote metastore uses MySQL. A remote metastore can host multiple projects. Each project is associated with an access-controlled databases that contains the projects resources.

A context for a remote metastore looks like:

project: ft-prod
metadataStore:
  host: 192.168.0.1
  password: XXXXXXXXXXX
  port: 32001
  sslVerify: false

Creating a context¶

To create a local or remote context in ado, create a file with the corresponding YAML definition (see above) and run:

ado create context -f $YAML_FILE

If the context refers to a local project (a local context), a SQLite database created for the project if it doesn't exist. If the context refers to a remote project (a remote context), the MySQL database for the project must have been created separately.

Listing available contexts¶

To see a list of contexts do

ado get contexts

This will output something like

                  CONTEXT DEFAULT
0              finetuning
1              ap-testing
2       developer-testing
3             mascots2024
4      caikit-testharness
5    materials-evaluation
6                 ft-prod       *
7            unit-testing
8       your-project-name
9  resource-store-testing

Note, the name of the context is the name of the associated project.

The active context¶

To use a context you activate it with:

ado context $CONTEXTNAME

and it becomes the "Active Context". All ado commands that interact with the metastore, like get, show, will be directed to the project associated with the active context.

Example:

$ ado context materials-evaluation
Success! Now using context materials-evaluation

To remind yourself what the active context is run

ado context

The active context is also denoted by a "*" in the output of ado get contexts (see output above).

Deleting contexts¶

You can delete a context using

ado delete context $CONTEXT_NAME

For remote contexts the delete operation only deletes the context yaml. The underlying MySQL database remains and must be deleted separately.

For local contexts, the delete operation prompts if you want to delete the underlying SQLite database, and thus the project. If you opt to delete the project, the data cannot be retrieved. In this case, if you recreate the context a new local database will be created.

If you just delete the context, the underlying SQLite database, and hence the project data, remains. In this case, if you recreate the context it will use the existing database.