The drops that still arrive as files
A large amount of business data still moves as a file left on a server overnight. The FTP and SFTP connector collects it, parses it and profiles it without anyone downloading anything.
How it works
Scheduled collection
Watch a directory and pick up what appears, rather than waiting for someone to remember.
Pattern matching
Match the files you want by name pattern so an unrelated file in the same directory does not become a dataset.
Parsed on arrival
CSV and delimited files are parsed and profiled as they land, with malformed rows reported rather than silently dropped.
SFTP credentials held properly
Keys and passwords belong to the connection and are not written into a flow definition.
What happens after it lands
Once rows are in the catalogue, the connector that produced them stops mattering. The dataset is profiled, can be cleaned, modelled, put in a flow, governed and published exactly like every other dataset — which means switching how data arrives never means rebuilding what happens to it afterwards.
Questions about this connector
Is FTP/SFTP available on the free tier?
No — file-drop ingestion is a Pro capability, enforced by the server.
What happens if the same file arrives twice?
Collection is tracked, so a file that has already been processed is not silently reloaded into a duplicate dataset.
Does it support SFTP key authentication?
Yes, as well as password authentication. Either way the credential lives on the connection.
Other ways in
CSV & Excel upload
Drag a file in and start working. Profiled on arrival, no schema declared up front.
Database
Read from your existing relational database and pull tables in as datasets.
REST API
Point at an endpoint, map the response shape, and land it as rows.
CDC sync
Change data capture, so the dataset follows the source instead of ageing.
CRM
Bring customer records across without exporting them to a spreadsheet first.
Data lake
Read from — and write back to — object storage you already own.
Documents
PDFs and documents stored whole, for retrieval and generation rather than rows.
AI model providers
Your own model credentials, held as a connection like any other source.
See it on your own data
DataLens is in private beta. Bring a file, a database or an API and work through the whole lifecycle in one sitting.
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