You’ve no doubt heard that data is the new currency or the new oil (and in many ways, crude oil). Hundreds of our customers have the same mindset and embrace and strive to become data-driven in their decision-making process. What’s a given is that today’s organizations generate large volumes of data that are then consumed and processed. Coupled with the availability of a plethora of storage mediums, both in the cloud and on-premises, this data is being created at a significant rate (that shows no signs of letting up). Hence, the appeal for data-driven decision-making is becoming the new normal.
The need to be data-driven
A pathway to becoming data-driven is to enforce data practices that empower an entire organization to increase positive impacts to the business. Equipped with the right set of tools, stakeholders across an organization can get access to the data that empowers them with what they need to know to take next steps and make decisions for the betterment of the company.
At SnapLogic, our quarterly product releases continue to exceed our promise to help our customers gain better access to data insights. In the November 2018 (4.15) product release, we launched the SnapLogic Data Catalog, available in SnapLogic’s intelligent integration platform. The SnapLogic Data Catalog, powered by the Data Catalog Snap Pack, provides improved data governance by enabling better visibility and transparency into an organization’s data. The metadata of the actual data that gets extracted from a database or any other cloud-based data store such as Amazon S3 can be maintained separately within the SnapLogic Data Catalog tables. Metadata that exists by itself in the SnapLogic Data Catalog tables does not offer too much value or insight, but when connected through relations, metadata offers a holistic view of the relationships that exist in the data.
The SnapLogic Data Catalog Snap Pack
Enable data governance initiatives with the following SnapLogic Data Catalog Snap Pack:
The Catalog Insert Snap reads metadata that may exist in an external file system (e.g., Amazon S3) and inserts that metadata into a given SnapLogic Data Catalog table. You can insert the metadata into either a predefined SnapLogic Data Catalog table or dynamically created catalog tables.
The Catalog Query Snap queries the metadata that exists in a given SnapLogic Data Catalog table.
In a nutshell, by leveraging the SnapLogic Data Catalog Snap Pack, you have the flexibility to perform the following actions:
- Create and insert metadata into either statically or dynamically defined SnapLogic Data Catalog tables
- Query existing SnapLogic Data Catalog tables
- Reiterate over point #1 to further enrich the content available in existing SnapLogic Data Catalog tables
Once loaded with the necessary metadata, you can view metadata properties such as:
- Location of the source data and metadata
- Schema properties associated with the data
- Relationships that may exist between the actual data and the metadata
- Data referenced across various SnapLogic Data Catalog tables
We believe the SnapLogic Data Catalog will help your organization reap many tangible benefits such as:
- Identifying ways to organize existing data in an optimal manner
- Describing your data and the value that it offers
- Enabling your data consumers to make business decisions that are influenced by facts based on data and not assumptions
We look forward to adding more data catalog capabilities to SnapLogic so that you can continue to improve data governance initiatives, while getting a more holistic view of your data. Watch the SnapLogic Data Catalog video to learn more.
