Create an instance and write data with the cbt CLI

If you're learning about Bigtable, you can work through a quickstart to get a taste of the fundamentals that you would use at scale in a production environment.

In this quickstart, you perform the following actions:

  • Connect to a Bigtable instance.
  • Perform basic administrative tasks.
  • Write data to a table.
  • Read data from a table.

Before you begin

  1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.

  2. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

  3. If you're using an external identity provider (IdP), you must first sign in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.

  4. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command: 

    gcloud init

  5. Create or select a Google Cloud project.

    Roles required to select or create a project

    • Select a project: Selecting a project doesn't require a specific IAM role—you can select any project that you've been granted a role on.
    • Create a project: To create a project, you need the Project Creator role (roles/resourcemanager.projectCreator), which contains the resourcemanager.projects.create permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    • Create a Google Cloud project:

      gcloud projects create PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with a name for the Google Cloud project you are creating.

    • Select the Google Cloud project that you created:

      gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with your Google Cloud project name.

  6. Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  7. Enable the Cloud Bigtable and Cloud Bigtable Admin APIs:

    Roles required to enable APIs

    To enable APIs, you need the serviceusage.services.enable permission. If you created the project, then you likely already have this permission through the Owner role (roles/owner). Otherwise, you can get this permission through the Service Usage Admin role (roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin). Learn how to grant roles. 

    gcloud services enable bigtable.googleapis.com bigtableadmin.googleapis.com

  8. Grant roles to your user account. Run the following command once for each of the following IAM roles: roles/bigtable.admin 

    gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID --member="user:USER_IDENTIFIER" --role=ROLE

    Replace the following:

    • PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.
    • USER_IDENTIFIER: The identifier for your user account. For example, myemail@example.com.
    • ROLE: The IAM role that you grant to your user account.

  9. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

  10. If you're using an external identity provider (IdP), you must first sign in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.

  11. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command: 

    gcloud init

  12. Create or select a Google Cloud project.

    Roles required to select or create a project

    • Select a project: Selecting a project doesn't require a specific IAM role—you can select any project that you've been granted a role on.
    • Create a project: To create a project, you need the Project Creator role (roles/resourcemanager.projectCreator), which contains the resourcemanager.projects.create permission. Learn how to grant roles.

    • Create a Google Cloud project:

      gcloud projects create PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with a name for the Google Cloud project you are creating.

    • Select the Google Cloud project that you created:

      gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID

      Replace PROJECT_ID with your Google Cloud project name.

  13. Verify that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  14. Enable the Cloud Bigtable and Cloud Bigtable Admin APIs:

    Roles required to enable APIs

    To enable APIs, you need the serviceusage.services.enable permission. If you created the project, then you likely already have this permission through the Owner role (roles/owner). Otherwise, you can get this permission through the Service Usage Admin role (roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin). Learn how to grant roles. 

    gcloud services enable bigtable.googleapis.com bigtableadmin.googleapis.com

  15. Grant roles to your user account. Run the following command once for each of the following IAM roles: roles/bigtable.admin 

    gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID --member="user:USER_IDENTIFIER" --role=ROLE

    Replace the following:

    • PROJECT_ID: Your project ID.
    • USER_IDENTIFIER: The identifier for your user account. For example, myemail@example.com.