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Preflight checks for dbt

TL;DR

This checks if manifest files are present in the provided bucket and prefix.

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Before running the dbt crawler, you can run preflight checks to perform the necessary technical validations. The following preflight check will be completed:

dbt Core​

Manifest file check on S3​

This checks if manifest files are present in the provided bucket and prefix.

✅ Check successful if Atlan can access the bucket and prefix containing the manifest files.

❌ Check failed

For example:

  • If Atlan cannot access the bucket - Manifest file Check on S3: failed With error code: AccessDenied - Access Denied
  • If Atlan can access the bucket but there are no manifest files present in the bucket - Manifest file Check on S3: No manifest files found in the mentioned S3 Prefix

Preflight is S3-only​

The manifest file check runs only for AWS S3 buckets (including the Atlan-managed bucket, which is S3-backed). GCS and ADLS connections have no preflight - their first failure signal is the crawl itself.

If you're on GCS or ADLS, verify manually before the first crawl:

  • The service account (GCS) or service principal (ADLS) can list and read the exact bucket/container and prefix configured in Atlan - test with gsutil ls / az storage blob list using those credentials.
  • A manifest.json exists under <prefix>/<project>/<job>/ with fresh timestamps from your latest dbt run.
  • The bucket name in Atlan is the plain name (no s3:///URL forms) and the Prefix matches the real layout exactly.

If the first crawl fails anyway, see Troubleshooting dbt connectivity.