A project is a collection of LookML files that describe how your database tables are related to each other and how Looker should interpret those tables. You can learn more about projects on the LookML projects and development model and LookML terms and concepts documentation pages. For information about accessing and editing existing projects, see the Accessing and editing project information documentation page.
A LookML project can contain more than one model file. However, if you want to specify permissions for users around seeing and editing LookML for a specific model file, you might want to create a new project. Although most permissions in Looker apply at the model level, there are some that apply to the project level, including see_lookml, which lets you view LookML for a project, and develop, which lets you edit the LookML. If you want to give users access to one model but not another, it's a good idea to create a separate project containing the model you don't want them to have access to.
Looker users with the manage_models permission can create LookML models on a Looker instance.
Creating a project
To create a project, perform the following steps:
Select Projects from the Develop section of the navigation panel.
On the LookML Projects page, select New LookML Project to select the options for your project.
This action opens the New Project page, where you can specify settings for your project, including the project's name and starting point.
Looker can create a project in several ways, and the steps taken depend on the Starting Point option that you choose on the New Project page. The following sections describe how these starting points work:
- Automatically generating a model from your database
- Cloning a public Git repository
- Creating a blank project
Automatically generating a model from your database
If you select Generate Model from Database Schema as the starting point, the LookML generator automatically creates your model and view project files based on the tables in your database. See the Generating a model documentation page for more information.
With this option, Looker asks for the connection name so that it can automatically generate LookML based your database. However, you can still add additional connections later.
Cloning a public Git repository
If you select Clone Public Git Repository as the starting point, Looker will copy the files from a public Git repository into your new LookML project.
Looker projects that are cloned from public Git repositories are read-only. However, you can import the read-only project into another of your Looker projects, where you can then edit the files. Additionally, you can use the cloned repository files as a starting point, then use the Looker extends parameter or refinements to build up a project from there.
To clone an existing public Git repository into a Looker project:
- Verify that you are in Development Mode.
- Select Manage LookML Projects from the Develop menu.
From the LookML Projects page, select New LookML Project to open the New Project page.
On the New Project page, specify the options for your project:
Project Name: Give your project a name. Choose the project name carefully and consider it a permanent ID for the project, since Looker uses the project name in the following ways:
- To identify the project for API calls that have the
project_idparameter. - To identify the project in the Looker instance's internal database.
- To identify the project for local project import.
- To display the project on the LookML Projects page.
- To display the project in the Develop section of the Looker navigation panel.
- As part of the URL for project files. For example, on a Looker instance with a URL of
example.looker.com, the project manifest file for the project namedecommercecan be found at this URL:https://example.looker.com/projects/ecommerce/files/manifest.lkml.
- To identify the project for API calls that have the
Starting Point: Choose Clone Public Git Repository.
Git Repository URL: Enter the URL for the public Git repository. Make sure that the URL is in the format
If you have a URL such asgit://github.com/example/my-repository.git.https://github.com/llooker/blocks_redshift_admin, you can edit it use to the correct format by replacing "https://" with "git://" and then adding ".git" at the end. The URL you would enter would begit://github.com/llooker/blocks_redshift_admin.git.
Select Create Project. Looker will pull all the public repository's files into a new LookML project and open the project in the Looker IDE.
Creating a blank project
If you select Blank Project as the starting point, Looker creates an empty project so that you can create your LookML files from scratch.
To create a blank project:
- Verify that you are in Development Mode.
- Select Manage LookML Projects from the Develop menu.
From the LookML Projects page, select New LookML Project to open the New Project page.
On the New Project page, specify the options for your project:
Project Name: Give your project a name. Choose the project name carefully and consider it a permanent ID for the project, since Looker uses the project name in the following ways:
- To identify the project for API calls that have the
project_idparameter. - To identify the project in the Looker instance's internal database.
- To identify the project for local project import.
- To display the project on the LookML Projects page.
- To display the project in the Develop section of the Looker navigation panel.
- As part of the URL for project files. For example, on a Looker instance with a URL of
example.looker.com, the project manifest file for the project namedecommercecan be found at this URL:https://example.looker.com/projects/ecommerce/files/manifest.lkml.
- To identify the project for API calls that have the
Starting Point: Choose Blank Project.
Select Create Project. Looker creates the project and opens it in the Looker IDE.
Once you have a blank project, you can create model and view files, and then you can connect your project to Git so that you can record changes to your LookML files and manage versions of your files.
Configuring a model
Use the Configure New Model button at the top of the LookML Projects page to add a configuration for an existing or a planned model.
Configuring a model for a project that doesn't exist yet is useful if the developers have not been given either the manage_models permission or the manage_project_models permission, as described on the Generating a model documentation page. If you configure the model for the developers, then they will be able to run queries as soon as they generate or create the model file. For more information about projects with only a configuration, see the Accessing and editing project information documentation page.
You can also specify which database connections can be used by the model, or you can specify that the model is allowed to use any current or future connections. Looker developers use the LookML connection parameter to specify in the model file which connection the model should use. If a developer specifies a connection that you have not allowed in the model's configuration, then any query on that model won't run.