Databases Reference
In-Depth Information
globalization of the marketplace, of distributed working, and
electronic communication explains the increasing importance
of use context. They can appear at any time during the
normal activity of a company. Equally, the data concerned by
this type of management by use context are very volatile. To
support this activity, it is important that the data repository
is able to ensure the following functions:
-
the users of the MDM system can, as long as they
have the appropriate rights, create and delete use context as
required, without it being necessary to change the data
model or software. The use contexts are themselves master
data administered by the MDM system;
-
all data is susceptible to be managed through use
context. Consequently, at the time of data modeling, it is not
necessary to determine which are candidates for this type of
management.
We will now describe how use contexts relate to each
other, in the form of affiliation, and subsequently how to
take advantage of this to automatically detect values
common to several use contexts.
6.4.1.
The affiliation of contexts
Contexts are not always independent in relation to each
other. It is sometimes useful to manage them as hierarchies,
according to an affiliation.
Here is a real example taken from a consumer credit card
management company. The IT platform of this company is
completely configurable with the help of a great deal of
reference and master data which relates to the process of
credit card enrollment. According to the partner that sells
the cards, sometimes in a white label approach, the
conditions of the discounts, the conditions of sale and the
conditions of use of the card are customized.
