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CSA Loom — the Microsoft Fabric experience for Azure tenants where Fabric isn't yet available: lakehouses, warehouses, notebooks, semantic models, Activator rules, Data Agents, across Commercial, GCC, GCC-High, and DoD IL5

Tutorial: Data API builder editor

CSA Loom data-api-builder editor — expose Azure SQL / PostgreSQL / Cosmos tables as secured REST + GraphQL endpoints with Microsoft Data API builder (DAB). No Microsoft Fabric required.

What it is

Data API builder (DAB) generates secured REST and GraphQL endpoints over a relational or Cosmos source from a single dab-config.json. In Loom the editor introspects the database schema, maps tables/views/stored procedures to entities with per-role permissions, relationships, and policies, emits the canonical dab-config.json, and — when a DAB runtime Container App is deployed — tests the live REST + GraphQL endpoints and publishes through APIM.

When to use it

  • You want a governed API over a database without writing a backend service.
  • You need both REST (OData-style) and GraphQL over the same entities.
  • You're building a Slate app / Ontology SDK stack — DAB is the query surface those items ride on.

Step-by-step in Loom

  1. Create the item. Choose + New item → Data API builder (APIs & Functions). The editor opens at /items/data-api-builder/<id>.
  2. Pick a data source. Choose Azure SQL / PostgreSQL / Cosmos and the connection — the connection string is referenced via @env(), never stored as a literal.
  3. Add entities. Introspect the schema and map tables/views to entities with REST paths, GraphQL types, and field aliases.
  4. Secure with permissions. Grant per-role create/read/update/delete with field-level include/exclude and database policies.
  5. Preview and publish. Validate the config, test the live REST + GraphQL endpoints against the DAB runtime, then publish the API through Azure API Management.

The Azure backend it rides on

  • Runtime: Microsoft Data API builder on Azure Container Apps.
  • Gateway: Azure API Management publishes the REST / GraphQL endpoint.
  • Data: Azure SQL, PostgreSQL Flexible Server, or Cosmos DB.

No Fabric required

DAB, Container Apps, and APIM are all first-class Azure services; no Fabric capacity, workspace, or OneLake is involved.

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