The right database tool can help you manage your data, analyze it, and make sense of it. It’s a critical step in the process of creating a catalog.
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What is a data catalog?
A data catalog is a tool that helps you to organize and describe your data. It contains information about each specific data point’s attributes, such as name, value, and unit.
Eventually, data catalog tools can store information about your business processes, customers, and products. This is useful if you want to track how much money your organization spends on different products or services. You can also track which products customers prefer the most or which they buy repeatedly.
To find the right database tool for your needs, you need to consider several factors:
- What type of data will you be storing?
- How much space do you have to store it?
- Is it structured or unstructured?
- How frequently will you need access to the data?
- What are the features of the database tool?
- Do they fit with your project’s needs and goals?
- Are there any features that seem unnecessary or redundant?
- Do they offer additional features that could be useful later on down the line when something else might need them?
- Does the tool integrate with other tools and systems within your organization?
Benefits of data catalog tools:
A data catalog is a way to organize your company’s data so that it’s easy for anyone who needs access to it—from executives down to field agents—to understand what information they require.
- A better understanding of data: A data catalog is a tool that helps you better understand your data. It provides context, which allows you to see what the data means. This can help you make better decisions and also give you a better understanding of why certain results came up as they did, which will help you reduce risk.
- Best results with data management initiative: When it comes to a data management initiative, the best results are achieved when there’s a clear understanding of what’s going on in the system—and that’s where the data catalog comes in.
- Reduce risk: A good data catalog allows people to find information quickly and ensures there are no false starts or wasted time when people try looking for something specific. A data catalog also helps reduce risk by making sure everything is organized so that there are clear records available for each piece of information
Features of good data catalog tools:
A data catalog is a tool that helps you manage your data. It’s designed to help you do things like:
- Search and filter your data, or provide an easy way to search and view particular fields of data in an organized fashion
- Create custom views of your data based on your criteria, such as content type or date range.
- Keywords can search metadata through several filters such as date range, type of content (e.g., text), or even specific individuals within an organization who need to see certain information at a certain time.
- Technical metadata describes data performance, APIs, file layout, and storage scheme.
- Social metadata constitute knowledge in the form of descriptions or explanations that can be shared with other users or systems.
- Business metadata describes the content of business processes, products, services, and activities.
Top options
- Alation data catalog: this is a standalone data catalog, meaning it’s not part of a larger set of software and can be used by itself. It uses artificial intelligence (AI) to capture context and make recommendations for analysis or design.
- Qlik data catalog: We’ve seen Qlik as the tool for transforming raw data into structured information. It’s built for business users, so it makes sense that it’s also designed to help with the rapid creation of metadata.
- Collibra data catalog: built with business end users, searchable repository. With Collibra, you can store data in a secure, user-friendly platform that allows you to find what you need and when you need it. You can also use this tool to create custom dashboards that highlight key metrics and metrics trends.
- Cloudera data catalog: allows users to discover and monitor data. Audit access and protect sensitive information.
- Cloudera’s data catalog is designed for organizations that want to manage their data in one place without worrying about managing multiple tools or platforms. Cloudera provides an easy way for users to find, search through, and audit access permissions on their data assets so they can ensure that only authorized people have access to sensitive information like credit card information or social security numbers.
- Oracle cloud infrastructure: if you want a tool that lets users search and explore their data no matter where they are located—even on an off-site server, then this data catalog is for you.
Data catalog tools can be used to solve many problems. A data catalog tool can provide a Business Glossary, through which the nomenclature is systematized. It contains business terms along with their definition, as well as an easy-to-use interface for creating, modifying, and maintaining data catalogs. The main advantage of using a data catalog tool is that it helps in creating a structured environment for storing and managing information.
