Simple Log Service provides the external storage feature. You can use the feature to associate Simple Log Service with MySQL databases, Alibaba Cloud Object Storage Service (OSS) buckets, or hosted CSV files. This topic describes the scenarios, benefits, and supported external stores of the external storage feature.
Scenarios
When you analyze data, you may need to obtain different types of data from separate storage resources. For example, you need to obtain data of user operations and user behavior from Simple Log Service, and obtain data of user properties, registration, funds, and props from a database. In this example, you need to classify and analyze data and then write the analysis results to the report system of the database.
To do this, you can migrate data to a centralized storage system and then analyze the data. However, the migration process is time-consuming and labor-intensive. Data must be cleansed and formatted during migration, and network resources are consumed. To address these issues, Simple Log Service provides API operations for external storage. You can call the API operations to achieve the following goals:
Define mappings between data in external stores and data in Simple Log Service. Data migration is not required.
Use a unified query engine. You can use JOIN statements to perform JOIN queries on data in Simple Log Service and data in external stores.
Store query results in external stores.
Benefits
Cost-effective
The external storage feature eliminates the need for data migration, which further reduces your overall costs. Data in different storage systems are stored in different formats. The API operations that you can call to manage data also vary based on the storage systems. This results in complicated data conversion during data migration. If you use the external storage feature of Simple Log Service, you do not need to migrate data.
The external storage feature eliminates the need for data maintenance, which further reduces your overall costs. If you migrate data, you must update and maintain the data at the earliest opportunity.
Convenient
You can use SQL statements to analyze data and obtain the analysis results within seconds.
You can add charts to a dashboard and view the charts when you open the dashboard.
Supported external stores
The external storage feature of Simple Log Service allows you to associate Simple Log Service with MySQL databases, OSS buckets, or hosted CSV files. The following table describes the supported external stores.
Supported external store | Read from the external store | Write to the external store | Method to create an external store | Supported region |
MySQL databases | Supported | Supported | API, SDK, and CLI | All regions |
OSS buckets | Supported | Supported | SQL create table | All regions |
Hosted CSV files | Supported | Not supported | SDK | China (Shanghai) |