The data assets in the data warehouses keep on growing in volume. The data assets without the context become difficult to understand, manage & use
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Business Metadata helps solve this problem
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Business Metadata provides context to the data assets like the tables, flows, models, dashboards, etc. within the organization through the use of Groups & Attributes.
It enhances the comprehensibility of data, Augments its discoverability and hence simplifies the Decision Making Process
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Watch Video
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Business Metadata: Explanation & Feature Walkthrough
Create Business Metadata
You can use Sprinkle to create Business Metadata for the data assets in the data warehouses, in just 2 simple steps.
1.
Admin
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creates New Attributes in the Business Metadata Section.
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Later, Other users or resource owners like Business Users, Analysts & Engineers
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can Tag Business Data Attributes to the data assets.
Admin
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can further create Business Metadata Groups, which enables grouping of similar kinds of attributes together.
Feature Walkthrough
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1️⃣ Add Attributes to the Business Metadata Group
Admin users can navigate to Admin -> Business Metadata Section. The Business Metadata Page has two sections, Metadata Attributes & Metadata Groups.
In the Metadata Attribute Section,
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Click on New Attribute and Fill in the details📝. The modal form that opens up has the below fields.
Name (mandatory), the name of the attribute.
Description (optional) briefly describes the attribute.
Metadata Group (optional), It is used to group together attributes. The list of admin user-created groups is available in the drop-down. You can choose from the list a metadata group.
Type (mandatory), the data type of the Business Metadata that would be captured through the attribute. It could be Boolean, String, Number, Enumerated List or Date.
Applicable Entities (mandatory), signifies the list of data asset types on to which the attribute can be tagged.
New Attribute: Modal Form
In the example below, we have added an attribute Business Function of type Enumerated List. This attribute can be used to tag entities according to the business function it is relevant. The check-box, supports multiple values enable users to select multiple values. The Metadata Group has been left empty.
Create New Attribute: Business Function
You can add more attributes as per the need.
2️⃣ Tag Business Metadata to Entities
Now that the Business Metadata Attribute has been created, any data entity can be tagged, adding the Business Function details to them.
Navigate to the Data Entity, where the Business Metadata needs to be added. Metadata can be added to any of the Data Entity, Data Sources, Flows, Explores, Segments, Models, Dashboard, Metric Alerts, Notebook, Catalog.
In the below example, we have added Metadata to the reporting Model. To Add Metadata,
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click on the Metadata button on top.
Add Metadata to Model
On clicking the Metadata Button, the panel appears on the right, with all the attributes created. You (resource owner & other users) can provide entries for the attributes and
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click on the ✔, to save it.
In the below
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example, the "reporting model" is tagged with Business Metadata. The Business Function attribute is set to Marketing. The Transaction Country attribute is tagged with Czech Republic & Slovakia. Other attributes can also be been set, as needed.
Provide values to the Attribute
➕Create Business Metadata Group
As discussed earlier, the attributes can be grouped together to form a collection of Business Metadata Attributes called Groups.
To create a new group or view existing metadata groups, go to the Metadata Groups section.
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Click on New Group, to create a New Metadata Group.
Fill in the fields, Name & Description, on the Create Metadata Group Form, and click Create.
In the below example, we have created, Metadata Group by the name, "Corporate Metadata"
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✏️ Edit Attribute
You (admin users) can also edit the Attributes created earlier.
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Click on edit button on the attribute you wish to edit.
In the below example, we edit Business Function attribute that we had created earlier.
Edit Attribute
We add the Metadata Group to the attribute, Business Function we had created earlier. The Business Function attribute has been added to the Corporate Metadata Group, below
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.
Now lets move to understand how the Business Metadata enhances discoverability
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🔍 Search
The search feature on Sprinkle is enhanced with the search & filter of data Entities through Business Metadata. Quickly find what you are looking for using the Business Metadata that has been added to data entities.
Below, the warehouse is searched as per the Business Function attribute that was created. The result shows entities that were tagged as belonging to Marketing Function.
Search & Discover Data: Using Business Metadata
Data Entities can be searched & filtered by various Business Metadata attributes. Discovery is enhanced with other advanced search features, to quickly discover the data entities, that you are looking for on Sprinkle.
To know more
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about the search feature on Sprinkle, visit theSearch page.
Customize Column Display
The Metadata tagged to the entities can also be viewed as columns on the listing pages.
And the customize column display option enables you to choose columns to be displayed.
The listing page has columns that show the business metadata related to the entities. In the below
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example, the columns highlighted below show the business metadata attribute values tagged to the models.
On the right, there is a icon to customize the column display option.
Model: Listing Page showing the metadata columns
The view can be customized to include the information & the business metadata as needed. Uncheck the columns that are not required. This provides a crisp view of the listing page.
In the below example, we have un-checked a few attributes and moved the corporate function attribute over the transaction country attribute.
Column Display Option
Preview enables you to view the customized columns in effect.
Applyingchanges save the customized view for all the users.
Voila!
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We have customized the columns enabling other users to discover data entities quickly with the help of Business Metadata.
Listing page view: After Customizing Column Display