Data products only create value when they can be shared and consumed easily, securely, and at scale. Delta Sharing was designed exactly for that: an open, cross‑platform protocol that lets you share live data from your databricks lakehouse with any downstream tool or platform over HTTPS, without copies or custom integrations.
In this blog post, I walk through Databricks‑to‑Open (D2O) Delta Sharing using Open Delta Sharing in a practical, step‑by‑step way. The focus is on helping data teams move from theory to a concrete implementation pattern that works in real projects.
What the article covers:
- How Delta Sharing fits into a modern data collaboration strategy and when to choose Open Sharing (D2O) over Databricks‑to‑Databricks (D2D).
- The core workflow: creating recipients, configuring authentication (bearer token or federated/OIDC), defining shares in Unity Catalog, and granting access to tables and views.
- How external consumers can connect using open connectors (Python/pandas, Apache Spark, Power BI, Tableau, Excel and others) without needing a Databricks workspace.
- Security, governance, and operational considerations such as token TTL, auditing activity, and avoiding data duplication by sharing from your existing Delta Lake and Parquet data.
- Whether you are building a data‑as‑a‑service offering, exposing governed data products to partners, or just trying to simplify ad‑hoc external access, D2O can significantly reduce friction and integration work
Here is a step-by-step guide to Databricks Delta Sharing using Open Delta Sharing (D2O).
1. Create Recipient
2. Create Delta Share and assign Recipients
You can create a OIDC Federation Authentication or Token based authentication for your recipients.
Tables with RLS and column masks cannot be shared using Delta Sharing.
Select Recipient you had created prior.
Additional Information:
