Approach & Learning Journal — Retail Sales Data
Pipeline
1. My Interpretation of the Problem
The task was to build a reproducible data pipeline that cleans and validates retail transaction data,
detects duplicates, checks data quality, and produces visual and JSON reports. The users are data
analysts who need clean data for trusted insights.
2. High-Level Approach & Strategy
I used Python and Pandas to create modular scripts for: loading and cleaning data, joining
reference tables, computing sales totals, and generating a quality report and visuals. Libraries:
pandas, numpy, yaml, json, and matplotlib. The pipeline runs through one command (run_all.py) for
full automation.
3. Personal Success Criteria & Learning Goals
Success meant a single-run automated process, valid outputs, and learning to handle data cleaning
& validation, YAML contracts, and file path or import issues.
4. Problems Encountered
Import errors (ModuleNotFoundError), missing directories for outputs/logs, FileNotFound and YAML
installation issues.
5. Solutions & Breakthroughs
Added __init__.py for proper imports, used [Link]() for folder creation, installed missing
packages and adjusted paths, and verified directories with [Link]().
6. Key Takeaways
Always validate data and directory paths. Keep code modular and reproducible. YAML and JSON
are great for configuration and reporting. Practice debugging improves pipeline stability.
7. Next Steps
Add logging, better visual summaries, config-driven parameters, and CLI automation.