Looker randomly failing connecting to data that supposed to be cached

[weiners7878]

It's obvious Looker is unstable, but what I get isn't normal, so I must be missing something.

I keep getting a Data Set Configuration Error. Looker Studio cannot connect to your data set.

I load my data with PostgreSQL connectors.  It's set to refresh every 12 hours.

On the same page, I feed several charts with data from the same data source. I'd expect either all of them to display the data or all of them to fail. However, some display data and some an error. Since that data was loaded successfully and is showing up in some charts, it doesn't make sense.

What am I doing wrong? It looks like every chart is loading data by itself.

[ArkadyZagdan]

@weiners7878 
General advice - get rid of PostgreSQL Looker Strudio connector and do it more elegant way - streaming data into BigQuery via DataStream and then feeding data into Looker Studio.

https://cloud.google.com/datastream-for-bigquery#serverless-replication-to-bigquery

This will greatly increase your dashboard performance, allow to have more frequent data, and what is more important do not interfer with your transactionnal database which may increase your DB costs and result in a database load and even safety.

I am not sure if you are connected to original database or replica but it may happen when tables are locked by some other actions - this should be troubleshhooted directly withh db admin and logs he may check. Looker studio forum cannot troubleshhoot each separate database connection error as they can be created by multiple reasons.

Arkady Zagdan
Bigglo.pl

[weiners7878]

Thank you @ArkadyZagdan  for the quick reply.

I don't want or need to complex my data pipeline with more tools. I expect the PostgreSQL to work. It has one task to run a query.

I am loading data from a replica and the query loads as I see data is several charts on the page. I just don't get why it fails on the other charts that use the same data source.

Here is how I'd expect it to work:

1. Run the query every 12h and cache the result in Looker backend.
2. On dashboard load use the cached data if exists or use the connector to load new data.
3. Display the data on all charts or fail all because of an error.

As I wrote some display the data, some not. It is random and simple refresh sometimes fix it or display the data on some and error on others that a minute before were displaying data.

[ArkadyZagdan]

@weiners7878 
In this case I won't be helpful:)

If you want to stick with a connector expect those errors randomly popping.
Been there, done that, encoutered even more errors withh PostgreSQL and MySQL connectors.
Frustrated, learned to do this more elegant way. Just like Google wants us to do which makes sense from Cloud cross selling point of view.

No issues with Looker Studio based on any SQL data source for more than 4  years until something crashes on the DB side.

Regards
Arkady

[pyatasya]

Same issues here @weiners7878 - charts are randomly displaying or not displaying data. Two charts connected to the same source will display, a third one won't. 
Have you been able to solve without using extra pipeline tools?