Configure AI features for your organization

Several features in Sigma use AI to accelerate insights and tasks that you might perform in Sigma:

• Sigma Assistant is a natural language query (NLQ) interface that allows you to ask questions about your data and interact with AI-generated responses. See Ask natural language queries with Sigma Assistant.
• The formula assistant uses AI to write new formulas, correct formula errors, and explain existing formulas. See Use AI with formulas.
• Explain this chart uses AI to instantly generate a description of any chart. See Explain charts with AI.

To use AI-enabled features in Sigma, do the following:

1. Set up an AI provider
2. Manage access to AI features
3. If using Sigma Assistant, configure data sources for Sigma Assistant
4. (Optional) Review data access for AI features

User requirements

You must be assigned the Admin account type.

Set up an AI provider

When you set up an AI provider in Sigma, you connect Sigma to either an external AI service or a data platform with access to specific AI models that Sigma can use.

• To connect to an AI model hosted by your data platform, see Configure a warehouse-hosted model as AI provider.

  When you choose the option to configure a warehouse-hosted model, your data is managed fully in your data platform.

• To connect to an externally hosted model, see Configure an external AI provider.

Manage access to AI features

You can control who can access different AI features by enabling feature permissions on different account types assigned to users. See Configure permissions for AI features.

Configure permissions for AI features

To control which Sigma users can access specific AI-powered features, enable or disable the relevant permissions for specific account types:

For more details, including details on which license tiers have access to these permissions, see License and account type overview.

Configure data sources for Sigma Assistant

When you configure a data source for Sigma Assistant, you make it available by default for conversations with Assistant. Users can also choose specific data sources that they have access to when asking natural language queries, even if they are not configured.

Select data models to take advantage of semantic modeling, relationships, and metrics. You can also select Snowflake semantic views, tables from connected data platforms, or datasets (deprecated).

To configure data sources for Sigma Assistant:

1. Go to Administration > AI Settings:

   1. In the Sigma header, click your user avatar to open the user menu.
   2. Select Administration to open the Administration portal.
   3. In the side panel, select AI Settings.

2. Select the Assistant tab.

3. In the Configured sources section, click Add source.

4. In the Add configured sources modal, search for and select one or more data models, tables, Snowflake semantic views, or datasets.

   📘

   When you select a data model as a configured source, only the published version of the data model is selected. You cannot select the tagged version of a data model.

5. Click Save to configure the selected sources for Sigma Assistant. The configured data sources are automatically synced and added to the semantic search index used by Assistant to select data sources.

📘

If you change data sources or metadata in your data platform after you configure those data sources, updates are available to Assistant within 2 hours. If you want the updates to be available immediately, return to this page and select Manual sync to update the representation of your data sources in the semantic search index.

Review data access for AI features

AI features such as Sigma Assistant respect the access granted to users for data sources. Each user can see and query only the data sources that they have access to. If you want to restrict what Assistant uses as a data source for answers for a specific user or team, restrict user or team access to the data source at the data source, schema, or table level. By default, Sigma Assistant only answers questions using pre-configured data sources. To configure those data sources, follow the steps to configure data sources.

To manage user access to data, review the access set on a specific data connection or data model:

• Manage access to data and connections.
• Manage document access for data models and datasets.
• Within a data model, you can also control visibility of a source: Enable or disable an element as a data source.

How Sigma Assistant selects data sources when answering user questions

When using Sigma Assistant, users can choose a specific data source that they have access to, or Assistant can choose a configured data source to use in the conversation.

If a source is not specified, the data source that Assistant selects from the configured data sources is based on the following factors:

• The user's access to the data source: Assistant respects the access granted to the user asking the question and does not expose data they are not authorized to use.
• The relevance of the data to the question: Assistant uses any metadata that exists to describe data sources and data columns, such as data model descriptions or column descriptions. If no other metadata has been defined, Assistant can infer relevancy from column names.
• The known validity of the data: For example, if a data model has an "endorsed" badge applied, Assistant is more likely to use that data source. Similarly, if someone in your organization has created and shared metrics and data models, Assistant is more likely to select one of those when answering rather than using a table directly from your connected data platform.
• The frequency of usage of the data source: Assistant is more likely to reference frequently used data sources in its answers.

📘

Adding metadata to your data sources for Assistant is not required, but it is recommended.

Assistant uses any available metadata, such as certification badges, source descriptions, table descriptions, and column descriptions, to determine relevancy to a user's question, but can also determine relevancy using column names alone.

To add metadata to data sources, see the following:

• Add badges and descriptions to connection tables. See Annotate tables with metadata.
• Add badges and descriptions to data models. See Edit a data model description and View and manage document badges.