Implement deployment pipelines in Microsoft Fabric

Deployment pipelines in Microsoft Fabric let you automate the process of copying changes made to the content in Fabric items between environments like development, test, and production. You can use deployment pipelines to develop and test content before it reaches end users. In this exercise, you create a deployment pipeline, and assign stages to the pipeline. Then you create some content in a development workspace and use deployment pipelines to deploy it between the Development, Test and Production pipeline stages.

Note: To complete this exercise, you need to be an member of the Fabric workspace admin role. To assign roles see Roles in workspaces in Microsoft Fabric.

This lab takes approximately 20 minutes to complete.

Create workspaces

Create three workspaces with the Fabric trial enabled.

  1. On the Microsoft Fabric home page at https://app.fabric.microsoft.com/home?experience=fabric, select Microsoft Fabric, then Data Engineering on the bottom left menu bar.
  2. In the menu bar on the left, select Workspaces (the icon looks similar to đź—‡).
  3. Create a new workspace named Development, selecting a licensing mode that includes Fabric capacity (Trial, Premium, or Fabric).
  4. Repeat steps 1 & 2, creating two more workspaces named Test, and Production. Your workspaces are: Development, Test, and Production.
  5. Select the Workspaces icon on the menu bar on the left and confirm that there are three workspaces named: Development, Test, and Production

Note: If you are prompted to enter a unique name for the workspaces, append one or more random numbers to the words: Development, Test, or Production.

Create a deployment pipeline

Next, create a deployment pipeline.

  1. In the menu bar on the left, select Workspaces.
  2. Select Deployment Pipelines, then New pipeline.
  3. In the Add a new deployment pipeline window, give the pipeline a unique name.

  4. Accept the defaults on the Customize your stages window.

    Screenshot of pipeline stages.

  5. Select Create.

Assign workspaces to stages of a deployment pipeline

Assign workspaces to the stages of the deployment pipeline.

  1. On the left menu bar, select the pipeline you created.
  2. In the window that appears, select on the word Select under each deployment stage and select the name of the workspace that matches the name of the stage.
  3. Select Assign a workspace for each deployment stage.

Screenshot of deployment pipeline.

Create content

Fabric items haven’t been created in your workspaces yet. Next, create a lakehouse in the development workspace.

  1. In the menu bar on the left, select Workspaces.
  2. Select the Development workspace.
  3. Select New Item
  4. In the window that appears, select Lakehouse and in the New lakehouse window, name the lakehouse, LabLakehouse.
  5. Select Create.
  6. In the Lakehouse Explorer window, select Start with sample data to populate the new lakehouse with data.

Screenshot of Lakehouse Explorer.

  1. In the menu bar on the left, select the pipeline you created.
  2. In the Development stage, select the > until you see Lakehouses. The lakehouse shows up as new content in the Development stage. Between the Development and Test stages, there’s an orange X within a circle. The orange X indicates that the Development and Test stages aren’t synchronized.
  3. Select the downward arrow below the orange X to compare the content in the Development and Test environments. Select Compare.The LabLakehouse only exists in the Development stage.

Screenshot the deployment pipeline showing content mismatches between stages.

Deploy content between stages

Deploy the lakehouse from the Development stage to the Test and Production stages.

  1. Select the Deploy button in the Development stage of the pipeline to copy the lakehouse in its current state to the text stage.
  2. In the Deploy to next stage window, select Deploy.
  3. There is an orange X between the Test and Production stages. Select the downward facing arrow below the orange X. The lakehouse exists in the Development and Test stages but not yet in the Production stage.
  4. In the Test stage, select Deploy.
  5. In the Deploy to next stage window, select Deploy. The green check mark between the stages indicates that all stages in sync and contain the same content.
  6. Using deployment pipelines to deploy between stages also updates the content in the workspaces corresponding to the deployment stage. Let’s confirm.
  7. In the menu bar on the left, select Workspaces.
  8. Select the Test workspace. The lakehouse was copied there.
  9. Open the Production workspace from the Workspaces icon on the left menu. The lakehouse was copied to the Production workspace too.

Clean up

In this exercise, you created a deployment pipeline, and assigned stages to the pipeline. Then you created content in a development workspace and deployed it between pipeline stages using deployment pipelines.

  • In the left navigation bar, select the icon for each workspace to view all of the items it contains.
  • In the menu on the top toolbar, select Workspace settings.
  • In the General section, select Remove this workspace.