About this user journey
This short tutorial will guide you through the main steps to import your data into the business glossary so that you can
- Describe and document from a business point of view your data
- Create and use the links between objects to benefits from graphical restitution such as the lineage
- Make your data available
This tutorial is followed by a selection of articles to guide you through your client space administration.
No prior knowledge of DataGalaxy is required.
Before you begin
Client space, workspace, module... so much terms ! for an overview of the main concepts and notions, please refer to this article.
If you wish, the first step of this quick start is described in this video.
First step : import your data
The business glossary is one of the four DataGalaxy modules. It's an organized collection of data objects, described in business vocabulary, for a company-wide understanding. concepts, business terms, indicators... can be described here. More about the glossary in this article.
DataGalaxy contains 3 more modules
- The Data Dictionary is a comprehensive inventory of the data available in an organization's IT landscape.
- The data processings catalog to describe all data flows between databases and the transformations in between
- The usage catalog to describe, from a business perspective, all data usage
Objects can be created in the glossary using 3 differents ways :
- Importing data using a CSV file : it's the quicker way to start populating your business glossary using existing files
- Using data from the dictionary : It's a quick way to start populating your business glossary but also create links with the technical counterpart of your business data.
- Manually create objects directly in the platform.
You may already have started to identify your organization main data in spreadsheet like files. It's a good basis to start populating your business glossary.
The first step is to understand how to format your spreadsheet to start populating your business glossary.
Two information are mandatory to import data into DataGalaxy : the path and the type.
- The path : Each object has a path, which constitutes the object's unique identifier. A path is an ancestors hierarchy. This path appears in imports. To start, you can use the name of your objects as the path. As your objects will become more complex, so do your path.
- The object type to specify which object you want to create in DataGalaxy. Find out more about the different type of objects available in the glossary here
For example : you want to create 2 objects : A KPI : "Margin" and a business term : "revenue". This is how your CSV files will look like
Path | Type |
\margin | \indicator |
\revenue | \business term |
Don't forget to save your spreadsheet in a CSV format.
A template to import data in the glossary is available at the end of this article. You can use it as is. More information is available on the file (the summary and a description) but they are not mandatory to import data. You can find more templates here.
to start your import, click on the import button on your workspace homepage. The import assistant will open. Select the "CSV file" option and browse to select your csv file. Next select the target module (the glossary) and what to import (properties) and launch the import. You can find more information here or watch this video
Second step : describe your data from a business perspective
As said before, the business glossary is an organized collection of data objects, described in business vocabulary. It can be used to describe your data but also model it to ease user's understanding of the data.
By default, the object card is composed of differents attributes used to describe the objects. This way you can specify :
- The object lifecycle : this attribute is used to identify an object lifecycle : Is it a recently created object? one whose definition has been validated? or an obsolete one that is no longer used? By default objects are created with a "proposed" status. Depending on the selected status, some editing restrictions can be applied. To know more about it, you can read this article.
- The object governance: each object can have its own governance, that's why each object can have different roles. By default each object displays two roles : steward & owner. They are automatically filled up with default values. Users with this kind of role can have extended rights on the object. To know more you can read this article
- Tags: are attributes designed to help you classify your data. Each tag has a color and you can use as many as required to classify your data. You can read this article to know more
- A summary and a description to describe your object.
If you already uploaded your CSV file, you can see that each object
- Has a "proposed" status
- A steward and an owner set by default.
You can upgrade these notions by adding information in the available attribute.
If you uploaded the CSV file provided below, you have a glimpse of the modeling capabilities of the glossary. Some indicators have been listed in a "indicator group" while the business term "SKU" has for parent a concept and a universe. This is because having a long list of objects without any grouping might be of little to no value for end users. That's why some objects are here to describe conceptual information. For ex. what is a "product"? The schema below presents the differents hierarchisation capabilities of the glossary.
One of the main strengths of DataGalaxy is its ability to create all kinds of links to identify the connections between objects.For example. it's possible to create a "is calculated by" link between two indicators.The easiest way to create those links is to open the service panel as shown below. 
For more information on link creation, you can read this article.
Third step : See the data
Objects and links have been created. The next step is to display those links using a graphical restitution. To do so each object has a lineage tab. You'll find two tools :
- The lineage: A data lineage allows the user to understand the traceability of an object by visualizing both the objects impacted by this object and what impact this object. More information about the lineage on this article.
- The exploration : It allows the user to discover both the semantic and technical scope of the data. With this feature you can navigate between the different objects. To learn more about this feature, you can read this article
Fourth step: make your data available
A question might arise once the glossary has been set up : how can we make this data available to users? two tools will help you :
- Filtered view : It is possible to filter your glossary and display only data that suit your needs. For example : you might want to see only data with a specific tag. That's what Filtered view is all about: only display data with specific attribute(s) value(s). These views are dynamics and results will be updated when using it. They can be saved and shared with all users (cf. this article to know more). Used with a list view, they allow the user to have a good understanding of a data scope (little extra : the list view can be used to modify in bulk your objects - more details here)
- Search : this feature is a gateway to use Datagalaxy for most end users. With it, end users can easily find informations, refine results... the feature can even be put as the welcome page. To know more please read this article.
Dig deeper
You can pursue your journey by adding different information. For instance, you can :
- Identify the different data sources. To do so, you need to create objects in the dictionnary. See this article to have a glimpse of the available objects and see this one to understand how to link objects from the glossary and the dictionary.
- Identify the different data usage (reports, dashboard, algorithm...) thanks to the usage module. Please refer to this article to learn more.
You can also get into the administration menu to customize your space (set up new fields for example) or invite new users. To do so you can read this article
We wish a good data journey.