Intelligent Data
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July 21, 2022

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Actian is bringing a new level of intelligence and control to the tasks of end-to-end data integration.

Actian’s DataConnect 12 integration platform focuses on major areas of enhanced capabilities: data quality, data profiling and automation. These areas will help users more quickly onboard and deliver a variety of complex integrations across their hybrid enterprise environments, Emma McGrattan, Actian’s senior vice president of engineering, told IDN.  

“As data becomes more critical for business decisions, simply having data integrated will not be enough,” McGrattan said. “Decision makers need to trust the data, and for that, they must have a way to ensure that their data is clean, consistent, and standardized.”

Specifically, DataConnect 12 sports a new level of user control and self-service through enhanced scheduling, SDKs (software development toolkits) and automation to improve development integrations.

The latest update debuts a new Data Profiler, which aims to ensure that “data pipelines are not just integrated, but standardized and accurate,” she added.   

DataConnect 12 Sports Data Profiler To Simplify Data Pipelines

IDN asked McGrattan to highlight some of Data Profiler’s more noteworthy features:

Delivers “clean, valid” data and avoids “dirty” data. 

DataConnect 12’s Data Profiler aims to make it easier for all users – despite their skill level to deliver data that is high-quality and accurate, McGrattan told IDN.

Data Profiler does help with dirty data and can identify and isolate duplicate, invalid or missing values. Customers are able to discover and profile their data against pre-defined rules or rule sets and then get a visual representation of their data quality in the form of charts or graphs. 

 

A very simple example would be a user combining customer data from multiple sources who wants to enforce a 9-digit zip code. Data Profiler would analyze the column (either user defined or automatically mapped during the merging process). It would isolate the records that do not conform to the 9-digit zip code rule so that users could correct the data issues. 

 

Can be used as both a “rules creator” and a “rules engine.” 

McGrattan said this dual power is delivered via DataConnect 12 Studio, which “provides a single user interface through which rules may be created. In that same Studio [interface], a flow may be defined in which the rules can be executed at runtime using the invoker.”

Lets users create interactive charts for self-service and troubleshooting.

Thanks to these charts, users can “drill into specific problem areas that need to be addressed," McGrattan said. These charts are especially well-suited to help users deal with many trouble areas, she said, adding:

Today, we are looking for data anomalies, such as non-standard, misformatted and duplicate data. Though, users can create rules with near limitless complexity. Since data profiling is an action on the DataConnect canvas, users can allow the data that meets the rule requirements to continue through the integration workflow and fork the dirty data to a separate workflow where other remediation actions can be applied (automated or manually) before the data is written to any databases or applications.”

 

Promotes a range of self-service features for data.

Users can drag and drop rules into workflows using the intuitive user canvas or use the command line interface to enable more customization and embedding. In addition, users can include the Data Profiler capability as part of their current data integration pipelines or as separate processing jobs.

Actian plans to add further capabilities to the Data Profiler’s unified interface. For example, the company’s near-term roadmap includes an ‘inline remediation” feature which will enable users to fill-in missing data (or delete duplicate data) even after processes are run, McGrattan added.

Actian’s DataConnect integration platform is a versatile, hybrid integration solution that empowers anyone to integrate anything, anywhere, anytime. With its emphasis on reuse, adaptability, and self-service integration, the DataConnect platform enables rapid onboarding and delivers accelerated time to value. With this latest product release.

Other Notable DataConnect 12 Updates, Enhancement 

Automation:  New functionality of DataConnect’s Automatic Map Transformers provides users more control over mapping data transformations between source and target data sets.

Other automation features invite users to create and store pre-built business rules sets and reuse common data quality rules when profiling new data. Actian is also letting users automatically convert connectors directly from existing maps. This low-code capability allows users to migrate entire databases quickly and easily to new sources as business needs change.

Improved SDKs: Actian is updating two of the most popular DataConnect SDKs to promote automation further.

The updated DataConnect platform SDK lets users automate their entire life cycle, from generating designs to monitoring execution. The DataConnect MCF SDK sports a powerful extensibility plug-in framework for custom connectivity, transformation, and processing.

These SDKs will also now be available on GitHub to promote access for DIY users, McGrattan added.

Other Key Updates: Actian DataConnect 12 integration platform also includes enhancements for other popular data-centric integration tools and technologies, including:

• Java upgrade (11.0.12+7)
• New and enhanced connectivity for RabbitMQ, JSON enhancements, and connectors for common enterprise applications
• Multiple UX improvements, including bulk editing, improved filtering, more robust search capabilities, and connectivity field level controls

For existing users, Actian is making it easy to update to DataConnect 12. "We have made upgrading to the new DataConnect 12 platform easier than ever, providing import utilities to aid customers on older versions. For customers on our current release, there is almost no effort needed,” McGrattan said. “This latest release will also provide new capabilities and accelerate integration scenarios for our customers using our Avalanche Hybrid Cloud Data Platform.”