About the Semantic Layer submenu in Stewardship

As a data steward, use the features in the Semantic Layer submenu in the Stewardship application to create and manage the semantic layer in the Guided Stewardship operating model. The semantic layer offers a business-centric view of data and consists of assets such as Data Model, Data Entity, and Data Attribute. These assets can connect the raw physical assets to the Knowledge Graph's governance assets, such as Business Term, KPI, and Data Category. For more information on the operating model, go to semantic layer in the Guided Stewardship operating model.

The Semantic Layer submenu is available if Guided Stewardship is active in your environment and you have the required permissions. It gives you access to:

  • The Semantic Models page with the semantic model editor.
  • The Semantic Assistant page, which combines several features to help you govern data and link the Guided Stewardship layers.

This feature is available only in the latest UI.

About the Semantic Models page

The Semantic Models page gives you an overview of all available data models in your environment.

From the page you can create a new semantic model via the semantic model editor. The editor allows you to create and manage the semantic layer by defining data models, data entities, and data attributes. If the Semantic model generation feature is enabled, you can ask Collibra AI for suggestions.

The Semantic Models page shows existing mappings between semantic layer attributes and physical layer columns, helping you validate and manage models more efficiently.
Click a data model to show the related data entities and data attributes. You can open the Task pane by clicking Tasks icon to check tasks related to the Data Model asset without leaving the page. If the new comment experience is enabled, you can open the Comments pane by clicking Comments icon to view comments for the data model without leaving the page.

Image of the semantic models page where a semantic model has been selected

For each data attribute in the data model, you get all related details such as their description, the related columns, business assets, and measures. When you click a hyperlinked asset in the data model, the related asset information opens in a Preview pane allowing you to manage models without leaving the page.

Once you have defined the semantic layer, you enrich it by linking the Data Attribute assets to Business Assets and Measure assets from the Semantic Models page. You can do this manually or get help from the semantic mapping Collibra AI feature. Even though you can also Column assets to the semantic layer this way, we advise to map the physical and semantic layer from the Semantic Agent page.

About the Semantic Assistant page

The Semantic Assistant page allows you to navigate to a specific Table or View and start several features that help data stewards govern and manage the physical data.

Available features

The available features depend on the active features in your environment and your permissions. They include:

Image of the semantic assistant where a table has been selected from the hierarchy

Navigating and searching

To navigate to the asset you want to manage, manually navigate to the required location in the tree view or use search.

From the top Search field in the tree view, you can search for a Database, Schema, or Table. Search results are shown as a flat list with up to 20 results. Click Show more to load additional results. Each result includes the full path for context. You can also filter your search to specific asset types. If you click a result, the navigation tree opens and shows the related information.

You can further limit your search to a specific Database or Schema by hovering over the item in the tree view and clicking the Search icon. This limited search is indicated below the Search field. Click Clear to remove the limited search.

Example of a search limited to a specific Database

Database and Schema dashboards

When you select a Database or a Schema, Collibra shows a dashboard with useful statistics.

For Database assets, the dashboard shows:

Schemas in database
Shows the total number of Schema assets in the Database.
Tables in database
Shows the total number of Table assets in the Database.
Database responsibilities
Shows up to 4 responsibilities for the Database asset. The responsibilities are collected in the following order: First key roles defined for the Database asset type layout, then the Owner, then the other responsibilities.
For information on the key roles, go to Asset layout editor.

For Schema assets, the dashboard shows:

Tables in schema
Shows the total number of Table assets in the Schema.
Columns in schema
Shows the total number of Column assets in the Schema.
Schema responsibilities
Shows up to 4 responsibilities for the Database asset. The responsibilities are collected in the following order: First key roles defined for the Database asset type layout, prioritizing the Owner, then the Owner responsibility, then the other responsibilities.
For information on the key roles, go to Asset layout editor.
Columns with descriptions
Shows the number of Columns with a description and the source of the description.
If an asset has multiple descriptions, it is counted only once based on the order in which the description availability is checked. The order is: Description through Semantic Layer, then Manually described, and then From source.
Description from Semantic Layer means that the column has a relation with a Data Attribute that has a description.
Columns with semantic mapping
Shows the number of Columns that are related to one or more Data Attributes.
Available for Database and Schema assets.
Columns with data classes
Shows the number of Columns that have been classified.
Columns with data categories:
Shows the number of Columns that are related to one or more Data Categories.
Only direct relations are counted. This means that if a data category is attached to a data attribute, and the data attribute is linked to the column, the column is not considered a column with an assigned data category.

Image of a Schema dashboard

Related topics

Helpful resources

Blog post: Introducing Collibra’s semantic agents