You need to add a new set of data to the bronze layer. This data is in an Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 account and consists of CSV files. You need to ensure that this data can be ingested and…

Creating an external table would define the schema over the existing CSV files but doesn't explicitly link them into the Lakehouse structure for seamless integration and processing as efficiently as a shortcut does.

Using Dataflow Gen2 would involve ingesting and transforming the data into Delta Lake format, which is suitable for subsequent layers (silver/gold), but for the bronze layer, the goal is often to land raw data efficiently without initial transformation.

Uploading the CSV files directly copies the data, leading to duplication and potentially increased storage costs, which is less efficient than directly linking to the existing data in ADLS Gen2 via a shortcut.

Creating a shortcut in the bronze layer Lakehouse that points to the Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 account allows direct access to the CSV files without data duplication. This is efficient as it avoids ingestion time and storage costs for the initial bronze layer and enables immediate processing of the external data.