Advantages of Databases and Metadata Management Tools

Most organizations have a shared vocabulary and agree upon the meaning of certain business concepts. However, these terms are often buried in Excel sheets. These data catalogs serve as a more centralized repository for these business concepts. They help organizations discover, curate, and enrich data. This article describes three key reasons why a database can be beneficial to an organization. This article also provides a brief overview of some key advantages of databases. Read on to learn more.

Data profiling allows data consumers to quickly understand what is in the data. Data profiles contain informative summaries of the data in a database. Database profiles typically include information like the number of tables and files, the number of rows and columns, the null count of a column, and maximum and minimum values of each column. Once created, data profiling can enable users to identify a particular data asset and its corresponding relationship to other data. Once a data catalog is created, it can be shared with others to improve the data management process.

The metadata that can be used in a database can include business knowledge, technical metadata, and operational metadata. Business metadata can include business descriptions, comments, annotations, and ratings. Technical metadata is particularly useful for facilitating data discovery, while operational metadata includes information about when the object was created, which ETL job created it, and how many times it was accessed. This type of information can be helpful to data curators and data governors. For example, metadata can help organizations identify sensitive data and establish trust.

Leave a comment