Playground
The Playground is Zingle's interactive data exploration surface. It lets you ask questions in natural language, generate and run SQL queries, and visualize data lineage — all without leaving the browser.
Overview
Navigate to Playground from the sidebar. The interface provides two interaction modes:
| Mode | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Ask | Ask a question in natural language and get a SQL query plus results |
| Agent | Run multi-step analysis, root cause analysis (RCA), and lineage inspection |
Ask mode
Type a question like:
"What are the top 10 customers by revenue this quarter?"
Zingle translates your question into SQL, runs it against your connected warehouse, and displays the results in a tabular format. You can:
- Edit the generated SQL — modify the query directly in the editor
- Re-run — execute the updated query
- Inspect schema — view the schema of any referenced table
- Preview data — see sample data from source tables
Agent mode
Agent mode supports more complex, multi-step workflows:
- Root cause analysis (RCA) — ask "Why did revenue drop last month?" and the agent investigates across multiple tables
- Lineage visualization — see how tables relate to each other in a visual DAG
- Iterative exploration — the agent remembers context from previous questions in the session
Key capabilities
Natural language to SQL
The Playground uses the same AI engine as Data Pipelines but optimized for ad-hoc queries. It understands your warehouse schema and generates syntactically correct SQL for your dialect (Snowflake SQL by default).
Query execution
Generated queries can be executed directly against your connected Snowflake warehouse. Results display in a paginated table with column sorting.
Lineage inspection
Click any table name in the results or schema view to visualize its upstream and downstream dependencies. This uses the same lineage graph that powers the Data Pipelines canvas.
When to use Playground vs Data Pipelines
| Scenario | Use |
|---|---|
| Quick ad-hoc question | Playground |
| Building a production model | Data Pipelines |
| Investigating a data issue | Playground (Agent mode) |
| Creating governed, tested pipelines | Data Pipelines |
| Exploring schema relationships | Playground |
The Playground is designed for exploration. When you're ready to build something permanent, move to Data Pipelines.