Business intelligence metadata

When you import BI metadata into the metadata repository, you can study the components of BI reports and BI models and how they are related. You can track database tables and columns that the BI reports reference, and the jobs that use the columns.

Business intelligence reporting is the means of publishing, distributing, and reviewing data results and information. Analysts must be able to understand the meaning and authenticity of BI reports, which are generated against data sources such as marts or warehouses. You might need to know when the content that feeds a BI report was last updated, and which InfoSphere® DataStage® and QualityStage® jobs or other other processes were sequenced during the update. Lineage and analysis reports in InfoSphere Metadata Workbench can display the complete data flows that transform and populate the source data that underlies the BI reports, thus satisfying requirements for data governance and data trust.

For a full list of supported BI bridges, see Import bridges that are supported at Version 9.1 of InfoSphere Information Server. Not all BI bridges import BI reports.

BI reports include BI report fields. Some report fields are non-data fields, including page numbers and section headers. Other report fields are data fields, which retrieve or calculate data from a data source. BI reports also include BI queries and query members, which source and aggregate the information to display from BI models. BI models are created within modeling tools such as Cognos Framework Manager and BusinessObjects Designer.

You can assign stewards and glossary terms to business intelligence reports in InfoSphere Business Glossary and InfoSphere Metadata Workbench. You can edit their descriptions and business names in the metadata workbench.