Build production Apache Airflow DAGs with best practices for operators, sensors, testing, and deployment. Use when creating data pipelines, orchestrating workflows, or scheduling batch jobs.
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Use airflow-dag-patterns to review [Airflow DAG] for idempotency, ownership, retry safety, observability, and backfill-duplication risks; do not change production schedules without my approval.
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[Airflow DAG]
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SKILL.md
name: airflow-dag-patternsdescription: "Build production Apache Airflow DAGs with best practices for operators, sensors, testing, and deployment. Use when creating data pipelines, orchestrating workflows, or scheduling batch jobs."risk: safesource: communitydate_added: "2026-02-27"
Apache Airflow DAG Patterns
Production-ready patterns for Apache Airflow including DAG design, operators, sensors, testing, and deployment strategies.
Use this skill when
Creating data pipeline orchestration with Airflow
Designing DAG structures and dependencies
Implementing custom operators and sensors
Testing Airflow DAGs locally
Setting up Airflow in production
Debugging failed DAG runs
Do not use this skill when
You only need a simple cron job or shell script
Airflow is not part of the tooling stack
The task is unrelated to workflow orchestration
Instructions
Identify data sources, schedules, and dependencies.
Design idempotent tasks with clear ownership and retries.
Implement DAGs with observability and alerting hooks.
Validate in staging and document operational runbooks.
Refer to resources/implementation-playbook.md for detailed patterns, checklists, and templates.
Safety
Avoid changing production DAG schedules without approval.
Test backfills and retries carefully to prevent data duplication.
Resources
resources/implementation-playbook.md for detailed patterns, checklists, and templates.
Limitations
Use this skill only when the task clearly matches the scope described above.
Do not treat the output as a substitute for environment-specific validation, testing, or expert review.
Stop and ask for clarification if required inputs, permissions, safety boundaries, or success criteria are missing.