Metadata, Master Data, Business Rule

Akhir-akhir ini saya merasa ketiga istilah di atas sering tercampur aduk, digunakan secara tidak tepat, salah konteks dan dipakai asal2an. Akhirnya saya mencoba mencari definisi tentang ketiganya (dari wikipedia) sebagai salah satu referensi. Dan inilah dia...

Sumber : wikipedia dll

METADATA Metadata (metacontent) is defined as data providing information about one or more aspects of the data, such as:

• Means of creation of the data
• Purpose of the data
• Time and date of creation
• Creator or author of data
• Location on a computer network where the data was created
• Standards used
• The song title of a piece of music

For example, a digital image may include metadata that describes how large the picture is, the color depth, the image resolution, when the image was created, and other data. A text document's metadata may contain information about how long the document is, who the author is, when the document was written, and a short summary of the document. Metadata is data. As such, metadata can be stored and managed in a database, often called a Metadata registry or Metadata repository.^[1] However, without context and a point of reference, it can be impossible to identify metadata just by looking at it.^[2] For example: by itself, a database containing several numbers, all 13 digits long could be the results of calculations or a list of numbers to plug into an equation - without any other context, the numbers themselves can be perceived as the data. But if given the context that this database is a log of a book collection, those 13-digit numbers may now be ISBNs - information that refers to the book, but is not itself the information within the book. The term "metadata" was coined in 1968 by Philip Bagley, one of the pioneers of computerized document retrieval.^[3][4] Since then the fields of information management, information science, information technology, librarianship and GIS have widely adopted the term. In these fields the word metadata is defined as "data about data".^[5] While this is the generally accepted definition, various disciplines have adopted their own more specific explanation and uses of the term. 

MASTER DATA 

Master data is nothing but unique data (Real data), i.e., there are no duplicate values. Master data, which may include reference data, is information that is key to the operation of business and is the primary focus of the Information Technology (IT) discipline of Master Data Management (MDM). This key business information may include data about customers, products, employees, materials, suppliers, etc. which often turns out to be non-transactional in nature. In this regard, master data can support transactional processes and operations, but its use is certainly not limited to such (analytics/reporting is another area greatly dependent on an organization's master data). Master data is often used by several functional groups and stored in different data systems across an organization and may or may not be referenced centrally; therefore, the possibility exists for duplicate and/or inaccurate master data. 

BUSINESS RULE 

A business rule is a statement that defines or constrains some aspect of the business and always resolves to either true or false. Business rules are intended to assert business structure or to control or influence the behavior of the business.^[1] Business rules describe the operations, definitions and constraints that apply to an organization. Business rules can apply to people, processes, corporate behavior and computing systems in an organization, and are put in place to help the organization achieve its goals. For example a business rule might state that no credit check is to be performed on return customers. Other examples of business rules include requiring a rental agent to disallow a rental tenant if their credit rating is too low, or requiring company agents to use a list of preferred suppliers and supply schedules. While a business rule may be informal or even unwritten, writing the rules down clearly and making sure that they don't conflict is a valuable activity. When carefully managed, rules can be used to help the organization to better achieve goals, remove obstacles to market growth, reduce costly mistakes, improve communication, comply with legal requirements, and increase customer loyalty.