Simplifying Agent Development with Astra DB Connector for Vertex AI Search

At Google NEXT ‘24, we're thrilled to announce a new integration between DataStax Astra DB and Vertex AI Search and Conversation. This integration empowers you to leverage your Astra DB data to build next-generation search and conversational AI applications.

What is Vertex AI Search and Conversation?

Vertex AI Search and Conversation is a suite of tools from Google Cloud that makes it much faster and easier for developers and  businesses to quickly  deploy Google-like intelligent search and chatbot experiences with a low-code / no-code approach. Vertex Search and Conversations makes it easy to make enterprise data available to Gemini and other Vertex generative AI models to understand user queries and provide relevant information or complete tasks.

What does this integration mean for you?

With this integration, you can now seamlessly connect your Astra DB data to Vertex AI Search and Conversation. This unlocks exciting possibilities:

• Build Smarter Search Applications: Use your Astra DB data to power intelligent search experiences for your customers or employees. Imagine a search application that understands natural language queries and retrieves relevant information from your Astra DB database.
• Develop Engaging Chatbots: Create chatbots that can access and process information stored in Astra DB. This allows you to build chatbots that can answer customer questions, provide support, or even complete tasks.
• Unlock the Potential of Generative AI: Vertex AI Search and Conversation utilizes generative AI models to create powerful search and conversation experiences. By integrating your Astra DB data, you can ground these AI models in real-world data, leading to more accurate and informative results.

Benefits of the Astra DB and Vertex AI Search and Conversation Integration

• Faster Time to Value: The integration simplifies the process of connecting your Astra DB data to Vertex AI Search and Conversation, allowing you to build and deploy applications quicker.
• Improved Accuracy: Grounding your AI models with real-time data from Astra DB leads to more accurate and relevant search results and chatbot interactions.
• Enhanced User Experience: Create a more natural and engaging user experience with search and conversation applications powered by real-world data.

Getting Started

Ready to unlock the power of Vertex AI Search and Conversation with your Astra DB data? This section provides a high-level overview of the configuration process. For detailed instructions, refer to our comprehensive documentation.

Connecting Astra DB to Vertex AI 

You have a couple of options for configuring Astra DB as a data source:

• Cloud Run Deployment: Deploy a DataStax-provided Docker image on Cloud Run to synchronize your Astra DB database with a Google Cloud Storage bucket. This method offers a serverless approach.
• Local Docker Container: Build and run a Docker container locally to perform the synchronization. This approach provides more control over the process.

Whichever method you choose, the following steps are involved:

• Grant the Cloud Run service or Docker container the necessary permissions to access your Astra DB credentials, Cloud Storage bucket, and Vertex AI services.
• Initiate the synchronization process using the provided commands or web interface.

Deploying your Vertex AI Search Application

Once your Astra DB data is synchronized with a GCS bucket, follow these steps in Vertex AI App Builder:

1. Create a Data Store linked to your GCS bucket.
2. Build a Search application using the new Agent Builder configured with your Astra DB Data Store.
3. Test your application by entering search queries or questions. Your application should retrieve relevant information from your Astra DB data.

Ready to learn more?

• Visit our documentation to get started with the integration
• Learn more about the Astra DB connector on the Google Cloud Marketplace